Rowan, a hypoallergenic ear-piercing jewelry brand and piercing studio, opened its doors in Palmer Square on Friday, Feb. 7.
I first visited Rowan on their opening day, and I was immediately greeted with bright, vibrant colors. Balloons in varying shades of pink decorated the already pink walls. While I did not receive a piercing, I was able to look around the shop and talk with some of the staff members.
The female-led brand named itself after Rowan County, North Carolina, where its founder, Louisa Serene Schneider, and her family grew up. One of the primary reasons that Schneider chose to start her business, hiring exclusively nurses, was the fact that all of the women in her family were experienced nurses and doctors.
Before arriving in Princeton, Rowan implemented many different business models. Founded by Schneider in 2018, the company was originally an at-home subscription box and piercing service, with licensed nurses performing services directly in the clients’ homes. In 2020, they also tested out an in-store model, where customers could visit their shop at certain participating Target locations, before canceling this partnership with Target in order to meet higher levels of demand from their growing popularity. Now, Rowan exclusively sells their services at their standalone locations, with over 60 stores currently operating in the United States.
When I contacted the Rowan Nurse Leadership Team beforehand, they declined an interview, but told me in a written comment that they designed their in-person studios with the purpose of “creating a welcoming space where everyone can feel comfortable.”
In the Rowan Store on Palmer Square, after I asked for the process of receiving a piercing, the first thing an employee told me was that all Rowan piercers were licensed nurses. Rowan also only uses hypoallergenic jewelry, which are made from materials that are unlikely to cause allergic reactions or irritation when coming into contact with skin.
“While piercing placement is mostly based on preference, there are a couple of key considerations. For example, some people may not have a wide enough space of cartilage for a forward helix piercing. When this happens, we ask the customer more about their ear stack goals and work with them to determine the perfect piercing placement for optimal healing and appearance,” the Nurse Leadership Team said.
Rowan even has a chart on ear types placed on their website. The types include a square ear, pointed ear, narrow ear, round ear, broad ear, and attached earlobe ear, and Rowan includes details on what specific jewelry accentuates each ear.
Finally, in order to actually pierce your ears, you can select either a needle or a hand-pressurized device and pick from their large collection of jewelry. In the Palmer Square store, many of the jewelry options are on display when you walk in; from gold heart studs to simple gold hoops, there are a variety of options to choose from, though depending on which type of piercing method you choose, the type of backing is different.
The needle piercings are performed with a single-use, hollow bore sterilized needle and can be placed anywhere in the ear, using flat backs. On the other hand, the device can only be placed on the ear’s outer perimeter and uses butterfly or bell back earrings, which are a bit more uncomfortable in the long run but also make it easier to switch out jewelry after the piercing has healed.
According to the Nurse Leadership Team, “Our device piercings are performed with a hand-pressurized device, which is in complete control of the nurse’s hand to guide, position, and pierce safely. It is nothing like a piercing gun, which uses a spring to pierce.”
However, it was a little unclear to me what differentiated Rowan’s device from a standard piercing gun—primarily because the device still forcefully pushes jewelry through ear tissue, regardless of the absence of any spring mechanism. If you find yourself preferring a needle-based piercing to the device, the base price rises from two piercings valued at $50 to $75, not including the cost of jewelry.
Nonetheless, when I visited, the in-person team was extremely helpful and friendly, explaining much of the consultation process, the differences in their piercing methods, and how their services are performed to me. The environment seemed clean and inviting, and certainly adds a new facet of cosmetology to the business scene on Nassau Street. If you ever feel the urge to change your look, I recommend visiting 63 Palmer Square West to try out Rowan’s piercing services for yourself.
Princess Fodeke is a contributing writer for The Prospect from Valdosta, Georgia.
Please send corrections to corrections[at]dailyprincetonian.com.
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