Purchased by me (BIG TIME)
When Hugo passed away last year, I wanted something to remember him by and though I looked through countless pieces of “pet grief” jewelry, ultimately I wanted something that was also relatively pretty and didn’t feel too cheesy. Luckily, I work at a wonderful Canadian establishment called Birks that offers a custom design option called “Birks Bespoke” that allows you to create a piece from scratch like I did or transform an existing piece. I thought I would share my experience as I receive the question often at work as well as help clients with their custom design pieces.
The Birks Bespoke process, on paper, is fairly simple: make an appointment with a sales associate, tell them what you want, receive a hand-drawn sketch and quote, finalize design and then wait for your piece to arrive!
One thing that I encounter with clients who are new to custom design is that custom is generally never going to be cheaper than buying out of the showcase so if you are trying to copy something from Harry Winston or Tiffany’s, you are most likely going to pay at least what it is in the showcase or more. This comes down mostly to the fact that custom is made just for you and getting a piece from a store is mass produced (to a certain degree). There is just one wax/mould that is made for your piece vs. multiples that are made for a retailer which means that costs are amortized over many vs. your one custom piece absorbing all of the costs.
So, with all of this in mind, I set off to design a ring that would honour Hugo. Since he was born in August, I decided that a birthstone ring might be nice and then when I remembered that both Hugo and Hemingway were born in August, I wanted a ring with two stones to honour the foster brothers I adopted together in 2015. Hemingway LOVED being with Hugo so much and they were often together whenever I came home from work so it made me smile thinking they could be “together with me” in this way.
Initially, I had also been thinking of doing a more asymmetrical look using one pear-shaped peridot and one oval-shaped spinel (both August birthstones) to represent each of the boys, but upon reviewing I decided to keep them both the same stones. I do not own any peridot rings so I thought it would be more unique to have a green stone ring. There was quite a bit of back and forth and eventually, I decided on two 0.70ct pear-shaped peridots that would be surrounded by pave diamonds. I chose to have the ring made in 14K white gold vs 18K or platinum to keep the cost down. This wasn’t going to be an everyday ring so I knew that going with white gold wouldn’t be too much of an issue when it came to the rhodium coming off (when the rhodium wears off, white gold jewelry looks yellowish). Platinum would have been around $1000 more and because I went with a predominantly metal-showing design, as platinum wears, it gets a bit of a brushed finish (white gold stays shiny) which I did not want.
![Birks Custom Peridot Ring Birks Custom Peridot Ring](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj1jqxUPKGRbUogQk288hyphenhyphen9-ttBgeFtFHWHuF6Z2Zv8PWezyohvvsdof6-2fj27G0SkRsBQbb6RMX1UK_NAmU-L5JOG3iFJVsy4yUbNYVlVfeYA7e4VaWeiRdMZZZd8mjvNHnoSK785RkmLtrN-lTfWP4_CnjufosTIGvi8QoiBBiMyl5HRCK9m8Fjd8Ih2/w315-h400/IMG_6918.jpg)
![Birks Custom Peridot Ring Sketches Birks Custom Peridot Ring Sketches](https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh4azo2G-8TxOqXPEItG7WRQIU3ovFAedX-2gkOt5gYS71EKXTSltCfwfTEioWS3szGlh0PyN1tVtz4-O6-L6VIYQv4xAZ4MdLV1jsJ_5Ix3nKnvoBsfV0cQu3xJjndQCCNYoUQHNt6r1Pqkn2dIK73IEsCFCpIr-Ob0-u7nofjtN8QyCrLq8kFyPTs9-wT/w385-h400/IMG_6917.jpeg)
Once I decided on a design, the ring took about 6 weeks to make plus a few extra weeks to have an appraisal done for insurance purposes. I started the design process in September and picked up my ring and documents in November. The big question was – did I LIKE how it turned out? I did, but let’s say it was definitely different than what I expected. The first thing that caught my attention was how much metal there was in the “twist” portion. I was not expecting it to be quite as thick as this, but it kind of made the ring look super fancy especially because the peridots looked so large! I am in the stage of my life where bigger is better so it kind of worked out, but this would not have been something I would have liked 10 years ago. It didn’t take long for me to make peace with the vision I had in my head and what was on my hand, but this is sort of what I mean when it comes to keeping an open mind.
I only really wear my ring at work (never at home) and take it off whenever we are opening or closing the store as firstly, peridots are not a hard stone so they will CHIP! Secondly, After about two weeks of having this ring, I wore it while opening the store and ended up catching it on the side of a wall because I wasn’t use to having a chunkier ring and ended up dislocating one of the pears AND chipping the culet of the stone (bottom of stone)…I had it repaired and it looked brand new, but as someone who has only had one jewelry repair in her 16 years of working at Birks, this was a wake up call! Now, I am very careful and remember to move slowly when I have it on because you don’t even realize how active you are with your hands until things like this happen and it doesn’t take much! I give this advice to all clients, especially with regards to their engagement rings, as those should be taken off at home and not worn 24/7 and I should have listened to myself!
Have you ever custom designed a piece of jewelry before and did you enjoy the process?
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#LIFESTYLE #Making #Custom #Peridot #Diamond #Ring #Birks #Bespoke #Cosmetic #Proof