17/04/2026
Sometimes I have the responsibility of taking on a job that maybe not many others would bother with. The risks are high, the design challenge is ... challenging, and the client has to accept the fact that maybe it might not work and there needs to be an agreed contingency plan in place.
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This was one such job.
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The exact history of this extremely large, and extremely broken diamond is somewhat unknown. The owner of it has generational ties to the English, Russian, and South African diamond and jewellery industries of the 20th Century. Yes, these eras and locations are fraught with political and humanitarian complexity, as is the majority of the history of the jewellery and gem industry.
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It’s a long and often dark history, but at what point does something like this broken diamond get to just ... be?
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It came to the owner already broken, but loose from it’s setting which she never wore anyway (because it was rather ornate and OTT for her taste).
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The diamond cutters weren’t prepared to recut it, the significant inclusions made it too risky. But the thing is, it’s still a diamond, it still has value, and sacrifices were made to get it out of the earth maybe around 100 years ago. It deserves to be seen, not kept in a draw for someone else to not know what to do with it in the next generation.
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When I set this diamond, I treated it like an opal. Gently gently. The inclusions are susceptible and one wrong hit would create a whole new problem. But thank the goddesses, everything went as planned.
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She may be included, damaged, with hardships only she can tell, but she has a fire in her that won’t be kept a secret any longer.
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Hand fabricated from the clients own recycled 18ct yellow and white gold and diamonds, and strung on her father’s heirloom chain. There could not be any more story in this one if I tried.
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Major grey hair inducing job this one, but I’m so stoked with how it turned out.
