After 86-year-old Barbara \u201cBarb\u201d Steinberg was moved to hospice in fall 2024, her daughter-in-law planned to spend an afternoon collecting Barb\u2019s costume jewelry, preserving anything valuable, sharing some with her niece, and donating the rest.<\/p>\n
Planning to finish the task in an hour, Lisa Weinberger arrived at Barb\u2019s Atlantic City<\/a> home. She first cleared the top of the bedroom dresser.<\/p>\n Then she opened a drawer.<\/p>\n \u201cI just saw layers and layers and layers of boxes of jewelry,\u201d said Weinberger, who lives in the Fitler Square section of Center City<\/a>. \u201cIt was just endless. It was in all of her drawers. It was behind the mirrors. It was under her bed. It was in the closets.\u201d<\/p>\n Stuffed into every corner of Barb\u2019s house, Weinberger found brooches and bangles, clip-ons and collars, rhinestones, sequins, pearls \u2014 thousands of pieces in all, she estimates. Most were still in bags and boxes, sometimes with price tags attached or notes from shopkeepers, \u201cSave for Barb.\u201d <\/p>\n A therapist who kept working well into her 80s, Barb came to family dinner in knee-high white patent leather boots and sparkly leggings, her white hair tipped purple and blue. She wore elaborate nail sets and, always, a complementary plating of jewelry on her hands, neck, and ears. <\/p>\n Barb, Weinberger says, never wore the same piece of jewelry twice. <\/p>\n She was a shopper, an \u201cexcessive collector,\u201d in the words of her son and Weinberger\u2019s husband, Eric Cantor. As her wardrobe expanded, it overtook her house, rendering parts of it unusable. Though she loved spending time with family, 15 years ago Barb asked them to stop visiting her at home.<\/p>\n So the sheer scale of Barb\u2019s jewelry compulsion came as a surprise to Weinberger. She was overwhelmed and called a friend and client of her design business: Nick Stuccio, founder of FringeArts. <\/p>\n \u201c\u200aI just said, I wish I knew a drag queen that I could give this to because it\u2019s just so amazing and so fabulous,\u201d Weinberger said. <\/p>\n \u201cAnd Nick said, \u2018Call Jarbeaux.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n The day after Barb\u2019s funeral in November 2024, Weinberger texted Jarbeaux, aka Rose Jarboe<\/a> \u2014 the creator of the Bearded Ladies Cabaret<\/a> and one of Philadelphia\u2019s leading nightlife performers. <\/p>\n Weinberger was a fan. She laid out Barb\u2019s vast stockpile and invited Jarboe to peruse, expecting her to choose a few pieces to wear onstage.<\/p>\n Jarboe said: \u201cI\u2019ll take it all.\u201d<\/p>\n Now Jarboe\u2019s basement in West Philadelphia<\/a> is filled with Barb\u2019s jewelry. Brooches are pinned up in her hallway and necklaces spill out of the drawers in her \u201cdrag room.\u201d Barb owned some higher-end fare \u2014 a Betsey Johnson, a Cartier \u2014 but most of the collection is cheap, even flimsy, but its incredible volume and diversity are impressive. <\/p>\n To a drag queen, said Jarboe, \u201cIt\u2019s like a dragon\u2019s hoard.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cJewelry is armor, and queer and trans people need a lot of armor right now,\u201d she said. \u201cI don\u2019t know what Barb was protecting with her mounds of things, but she had plenty of armor to share.\u201d<\/p>\n Jarboe began distributing the jewelry among Philadelphia\u2019s drag queens and nightlife performers, one piece of bling at a time. <\/p>\n Jewelry is armor, and queer and trans people need a lot of armor right now. I don\u2019t know what Barb was protecting with her mounds of things, but she had plenty of armor to share.<\/p>\n Jarboe<\/p>\n Martha Graham Cracker<\/a>, Lili St. Queer, and Cookie Diorio<\/a> have all made appearances bedecked in Barb\u2019s bling. At the Bearded Ladies\u2019 run of Christmas-themed performances at the Wanamaker Building last year<\/a>, the performers wore Barb\u2019s baubles, and the audience was invited to take some home. <\/p>\n \u201cEveryone\u2019s kind of wearing Barb this season,\u201d Jarboe said. <\/p>\n Weinberger also donated boxes of jewels to the Norwalk Conservatory of the Arts\u2019 theater and drag programs. But still, there are mountains left. <\/p>\n The Bearded Ladies will try to give the rest away. <\/p>\n On Monday\u2019s Sing-Along<\/a> \u2014 sorry, \u201cBling-Along\u201d \u2014 at Broad Street Love, jewelry will be on display for the audience to take: free for members ofthe queer, drag, and performance communities and by donation for everyone else. <\/p>\n There will also be an option to \u201csponsor a bag\u201d and buy jewelry for a drag queen, with all the proceeds split between the Bearded Ladies and Broad Street Love.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s a time of scarcity. Many people have limited imagination around the value of queer people in our lives and trans people specifically,\u201d Jarboe said. She wants to spread the abundance, and she really wants anyone who receives Barb\u2019s jewelry to appreciate it. <\/p>\n \u201cMy rule is you have to know it\u2019s [from] Barb,\u201d she said, \u201cAnd you kind of have to thank Barb.\u201d<\/p>\n \u2018This woman is a riot\u2019<\/p>\n To know Barb wasn\u2019t always easy, said Weinberger, who met her mother-in-law for the first time in the mid-1990s at a greasy-spoon diner in the Northeast.<\/p>\n \u201cThere was Barb, wearing this full-length gown that was see-through, and made out of lace,\u201d Weinberger said. \u201cAnd I was like, wow, this woman is a riot.\u201d<\/p>\n Born in West Philadelphia, Barb moved to Rhawnhurst<\/a> with her first husband, where she had two sons: Glenn and Eric. When Eric Cantor was 4, his parents divorced and Barb remarried.<\/p>\n She was always a collector, Eric Cantor said, who dragged him to flea markets in search of Nippon salt shakers and porcelain figurines. Barb had new closets built in their house to accommodate her ever-growing clothing collection.<\/p>\n \u201cShe was always fahpitzed,\u201d said Cantor, using a Yiddish term for \u201cdressed to the nines.\u201d <\/p>\n