Dancing Hands Jewelry — Local services in Town of New Paltz

UPDATE 5/15: 2/5 Taking down the insensitive pretendian stuff is much appreciated, I'd like to see some proper traditional made native crafts being sold. As this is mainly a reselling store I'd be glad to see some more care put into the source of the products. For instance, investment in actual traditionally made dreamcatchers would be a start, even despite possibly being a higher price point than something cheap and imported from another country. Original Review: 1/5 stars I am a long-time customer of Dancing hands, and have bought gifts for family and friends from this shop since I began college in 2023. Today, a couple of friends and I were wandering around town when we came across Dancing Hands. While browsing the jewelry and crystals, my girlfriend and I noticed their selection of dream catchers. What stood out—and honestly shocked us—was that the word "Indian" had been either cut out or taped over on every single label, leaving just "Dream Catcher."

It’s clear this was done intentionally, likely because the term "Indian" is considered inaccurate and derogatory when referring to Native Americans. I appreciate the effort to be more respectful, but the way it was handled felt awkward and inconsistent. It would be better if the store invested in Native-sourced products that give proper credit and benefit the cultures these items originate from.

I was told that the dreamcatchers weren’t even made by native craftsmen, but rather made in India due to the cheap price and quality. Jokingly it was brought up that the term “Indian” could be referring to their origins outside the americas, but this was clearly disingenuous and easily disproved by the blatantly racist mysticism on the back of the label. I think the band-aid fix of covering the racist label of this outsourced native art is clearly performative in nature, and it was clear that no Natives were consulted in any part of this process.

When I brought up my perspective as an indigenous person, the owner and I seemed to agree that it was not “politically correct.” Nonetheless after only a bit more pressing my concerns were brushed off as simply “aggressing” and holding up other customers.

This experience left a nasty impression—it’s important to show cultural respect thoughtfully, not just by covering things up. I can’t in good faith return to this shop, seeing as these practices do not...

My friends and I came here earlier today and the store was SO cute! Unfortunately we were a little thrown off when we overheard one of the workers walk over to semi-check on us while we were browsing and said “Oh they don’t know what they’re doing in here” and walked away - no clue if they were alluding to the fact that we supposedly didn’t know all that much about crystals (aka what they were mainly selling)? We were there to purchase something regardless & some other customers were super knowledgeable about what they were looking for, but I honestly thought I heard the worker wrong until my friend confirmed she heard the same thing after we had left. I also want to add that I really don’t care for retail workers to immediately rush to my need when I’m just looking around because I don’t feel like they owe that to me; but even after the store cleared out only one worker out of three even bothered to strike up some sort of conversation with us about the rings we were looking at, even though the other two women had seen us the entire time. I can’t believe I’m writing a Google review because I somehow got criticized for my lack of crystal knowledge?? But...

Beautiful crystals, but unprofessional business practices. We visited for our first time and I asked if I could buy one of the two crystals apart of a set. The store owner said sure and we agreed on the price of $40. I asked if I should buy it now or on my way back to our car (since we were going to be walking a lot and I didn’t want it to get damaged). He said he would honor the price and we could pay and pick it up on our way back. But when we returned 2 hours later, he told me he changed his mind and upped the price to $55. Here I am looking like a fool thinking I should have just bought the crystal and left the first time, since clearly he is not a man of his word. This is not his first rodeo, so he should have known the price he was okay with selling his crystals at the first time. Sadly I will not be returning, as I don’t feel like getting taken...