The beauty of Chinese jewellery is wearing them small and big. Some very small, some very ‘big’.For instance, I consider all jade bangles ‘big’. When someone wears a jade bangle, you cannot help but notice the bangle first, however common, or unique.

Jade and Turquoise are two very spiritual stones. Yes, they are really stones more than gems, although jadeite jade is regarded as a modern day precious gemstone.

Both are opaque in their beauty. Both suggest the sky is not clear if you cannot see.

Jade Diamond Necklace | Jade Diamond Drop Earrings | Gem Gardener

I collect hands, wooden, ceramic, metal… In the ceaseless search I always imagine their fingers plied with rings and jewels, but when I get them, I leave them bare. Now they display to the world their potential for something.

Harry Nilsson covered this song in 1973. His version is my favourite.

Lullaby in Ragtime

Tell you a secret. We hated having a signage so much we just settled for ‘Cinematic Bespoke Jewellery’. That didn’t do anything except let us indulge in our own neon-lit fantasies, and for that useful only at night when no one is around! If you’ve every walked around a street or mall emptied of people, and you love it, you will understand our fantasy. And our stubbornness to be out walking that lonely road. Farthest only when cycling.

Gem Gardener

Our guide to gems will tell you what most other guides won’t tell you, which is: do not judge a stone by its colour. When shopping for a gem.

A typical gem guide will tell you to look out for cut and colour and size and origin – all the things you probably already know about. Those things are important if all you are doing is buying a gem based on numbers and figures, but let’s not forget that most of us buy gems to use in jewellery.

Only when the gem is set in jewellery will it look complete. And whatever the colour and quality of a gem, it is the setting that will reveal the potential of a gemstone.

There are two types of rose cut diamonds seen in much of the jewelry in this region, specifically South-east Asia. One is the ‘Western’ rose cut diamond and the other is the Straits Chinese rose cut diamond (intan). The Straits Chinese rose cut diamond is quite similar to the Indian polki diamond, which is an Indian cut diamond slice.

Historically the Western rose cut is hand cleaved, much like the Straits Chinese rose cut diamond. Hand cleaved diamonds reveal techniques of hand-cutting, with uneven facets at the crown of the diamond.