GOLD STANDARD. Sidney Maletto, new owner of Eric’s Diamonds, says she wants to maintain the store’s level of quality and customer service.

Sidney Maletto is putting a new sparkle on a longstanding downtown Chippewa Falls business.

Maletto and her husband, Matthew, are the new owners of Eric’s Diamonds, 111 N. Bridge St., which reopened in early March. Now, she’s looking forward to creating heirloom quality jewelry for customers.

For about eight years, Malletto apprenticed for Eric Pulver, the founder and recently retired owner of Eric’s Diamonds.

Much of the jewelry business still depends on such apprentice-style training, Maletto explained. “It’s such a good way to learn,” she said. “It’s a trade, almost, so it’s something that’s done best with hands-on learning. You can read all the books you want, but to make a pair of matching earrings you have to go out and make a pair of matching earrings.”

Maletto grew up going to school with Pulver’s children, and jokes that it’s been her “long game” to buy the jewelry store since the fourth grade. In reality, her association with the business began around 2015, after she graduated from UW-La Crosse with an art degree. At that time, Pulver needed a goldsmith, and Maletto already had some experience working with metals – such as zinc and copper – from printmaking.

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It’s a trade, almost, so it’s something that’s done best with hands-on learning. You can read all the books you want, but to make a pair of matching earrings you have to go out and make a pair of matching earrings.

SIDNEY MALETTO

new owner, eric's diamonds & fine jewelry

She’s able to create custom pieces – doing the casting, computer aided design, and fabrication herself in-house – as well as repair and rework old jewelry. In fact, Maletto’s favorite kind of work is taking heirloom jewelry that may have come from a grandmother or aunt and repairing or customizing it.

“Jewelry itself is a very sentimental thing,” she said. “Each piece has a story, so it’s fun to rework a story.”

Eric's Diamonds is housed in a historic building at 111 N. Bridge St., Chippewa Falls.

Naturally, Eric’s Diamonds has its own story: Eric Pulver started his jewelry business in 1990. Originally, it was an outgrowth of Foreign 5, a gift, bridal, and floral shop his parents, Mary Lou and Don, opened at 111 N. Bridge St. in the 1970s. While Foreign 5 eventually moved down the block, Eric’s Diamonds found its permanent home at 111 N. Bridge St. in 1999. The historic building, which features sandstone columns and other Romanesque revival features, was originally built as a bank in 1873 and underwent an award-winning restoration two decades ago.

Now that she’s taken the reins, Maletto plans to provide the same kind of quality and service that the public has come to expect over the past 30-plus years, as well as to add more custom jewelry to the mix: “I’m really looking forward to doing maybe a full in-house line: My own design, my own inspiration, to sell those to people that want them – people who let me do whatever I want to do.”

Ultimately, she added, the jewelry business is about people, and connecting them with beautiful things that they will use in their everyday lives – whether that means brand-new jewelry or reworked heirlooms.

“It doesn’t do anybody any good if it’s sitting in a jewelry box,” she said.

Eric’s Diamonds & Fine Jewelry • 111 N. Bridge St., Chippewa Falls • (715) 723-0180 • malettosidney@gmail.com • Find them on Facebook