Quality Union

Erik and Dallae are amazing. Every day they come in and craft exquisite pieces with a level of integrity that transforms into some of the best quality work I've ever seen in the US. Today, they amazed again with a simple joining together of two wedding bands job.
First a little backgroung: A couple came in with a wedding set. Put them together so they don't come apart. Simple, take it to most jewelry stores and they put a little solder inside, heat, and call it a day. In the studio, we just do things differently. Instead of soldering, we laser weld. Soldering involves using a metal, most often not even the same metal as the original ring (also usually very toxic! containing lead, cadmium, arsenic or a whole host of other yuck and not containing any gold or platinum) that melts at a lower temperature in between the rings which holds them together. This bond is usually around 40-50% strong as the original metal. Laser welding is done by focusing a beam of energy to create a pinpoint weld. The metal from the two rings instantly melts together and fuses them. This creates a bond that is 95% strong as the original metal!
This strength is especially important for a wedding set that gets worn every day, as there are the constant mechanical forces of touching things, gripping, bumping hands against furniture, squeezing the steering wheel, and everything else we do with our hands.

Okay, on to the amazed part. The quality of the weld Dallae did with the laser is some of the finest I have ever seen. Looking inside, I can't even tell that there were two rings to begin with. Outside, the rings look held together by magic. Perfectly smooth, not a spot or even a line. The rings were not even designed to be fit together, and were different sizes! Yet she achieved a grace and elegance between the balance of the two rings with the cleanest joining, inside and out.

It is craftsmanship such as this that makes me proud of my jewelers, and proud of the studio. There is no delineation between an intricate custom hand fabricated job and a simple repair, the integrity is total. Nothing is rushed or pushed through, there is no second rate or good enough; every piece is given all that is in our hearts and abilities.












With Everything,


Justinder

If it's too good to be true, it probably is. A study in Integrity

I am once again outraged and my heart broken by the jewelry industry. Today another couple came in who had been hoodwinked, cheated, misled, lied to and taken advantage of.
This couple purchased their engagement ring with innocence and trust in their local independent jeweler. They were told the diamond they were purchasing was certified, of good quality and great value. When they picked up the ring, there was no certification. They didn't feel comfortable and asked for the diamond certificate. He said the diamond didn't have one, and the receipt was just as good. They didn't feel comfortable and demanded a certificate. Their jeweler sent the ring in for 'certification' and they got a 'certificate' back stating the value of their diamond. However, they didn't notice their 'certificate' was different from their receipt and appraisal. They took the jewelers word as they now had what they thought was independent verification.
They brought their ring in to me to have sized as they didn't feel comfortable going back to their original jeweler. We noticed their was a heavy concentration of inclusions that reached the surface and wanted to make them aware that they should be careful with the diamond as inclusions that reach the surface, especially on the table (the top flat part) and the girdle (the rim that goes all the way around the diamond), make the diamond susceptible to fracturing with even a slight impact.
They were alarmed as they thought they had a good quality stone. When I asked them what they were told the quality of the stone was I was shocked, as it didn't come close to the quality of what I had inspected and was still holding in my hands. I showed them the diamond under a microscope and they too were alarmed. I asked them to bring me the certification they had received so I could see why there was a discrepancy.
When they showed me their receipt, appraisal and certification red flags went up immediately as there was no correlation between them. The appraisal, written and signed by them, stated the center diamond was an H color SI-2. The 'certification' from a well known diamond grading house stated the diamond was a G color I-1. The value difference between the quality of what they were told and sold and the 'certified' quality of the diamond was over 40%!!!
That wasn't the worst of it, their 'certificate' was really just an id card of the ring that had been graded with the diamonds already in the ring and not an actual diamond certificate, in fact I have never seen a 'certificate' like it and doubt its legitimacy.
They are going to go back to the jeweler and see what he can do to rectify the situation, however they have lost all faith in him and are even unsure of how he can rectify the situation as they were misled when last they tried with him.
This event has strengthened my resolve to grow a studio whose every building block if founded in Integrity and Openness.

With Everything,

Justinder

Alpha and Alumina

Apparently I do a terrible job of keeping track of all our advancements. Even though I haven't finalized my writing about what we are doing to be Toxin Free and Conscious, I'm going to start posting up the little things to remind myself of what I've done.
Yesterday, I ordered our new Platinum polishing compound. It is a three stage compound of varying grit we put on the buffing wheel to give platinum the finest shine and polish. We used to use a highly toxic polishing compound made with aluminum oxide and animal tallow (the, um, other parts of animals that don't get eaten, gross). The new compound uses Alpha Alumina, a more stable form of Aluminum (which is still toxic), and bees wax as a binder.
This new compound has a much lower chance of entering the blood stream when inhaled as it is more stable than the aluminum oxide, which is a type of salt and easily enters the blood stream, even through the pores in our skin. Plus, it's nice knowing we're not using animal leftovers. Regardless, our polishing system is enclosed to prevent the inhalation of any dust which is harmful in and of itself.

Always trying,

Justinder

Pushing Daisies - A tribute to Pandora

I had a customer who was with the studio before I decided to create the studio, was with me while I was in the beginning stages of its creation, and was sad when we were leaving.

Recently she had gone to many jewelry stores looking for a pendant of a cat. After many 'salesman' pitches, the same generic pieces, and lack of creativity from 'custom' jewelers, she sent me this following e-mail, she didn't know I had decided to keep the studio open:

"Justin,

I am really feeling the need for a new piece of jewelry. A yellow gold pendant to go on a rope chain. I like hearts and flowers, but I don’t want it to look too commercial. Looking for that unique piece I know you can create. Any ideas? I never thought I would miss your creativity so much, but I have been to several other jewelry stores and their selection is generic, their prices are too high and they don’t seem to care.

Please help,

Paige S."

We set up an appointment and today she came in. I have decided, with her permission, to share the creation process. First, the inspiration:

Paige's cat Pandora recently passed away. Pandora was a big part of Paige's life, her presence was comforting to Paige as she went through a difficult time. Paige had Pandora cremated and will be putting her in the flower bed. Paige always said the cat smelled like flowers, and now Pandora will litteraly be 'pushing daisies' and playing around the garden. Pandora had green eyes and liked to sleep a lot.

Now, the concept:

Daisy with cat pendant. Naturally shaped daisy, the size of a quarter, with naturally shaped and irregular petals, with checkerboard cut citrine center with vivid yellow bezel. Naturally shaped cat poking its head out of the side with green sapphire eyes and long whiskers which come outside the circumference of the design. 14k yellow and 14k palladium white gold. 22k plated center bezel. Hand fabricated.

The rough sketch:

I will continue to post photos and notes as we work through the fabrication process.

This is my first time sharing the intimacy of our process, thank you Paige for willing to share a beautiful facet of your heart!

With Everything,

Justinder

Keep In Touch

A lot of people have been curious about how the jewelry industry can be so damaging to our earth and what we're doing to be environmentally and socially conscious. It has been a long and hard road of research, experimentation, trial and error, questions, seminars, and good old blood and sweat in establishing our methods and materials, but we are almost there! I will be writing about it shortly so stay tuned.

If you would like to keep in touch, please e-mail me at: abbeyjewelrystudio@gmail.com
and I will add you to my contacts (especially good for craft beer nights at the studio!)

With Everything,

Justinder

Integrity in Metals

The world of metals has me pulling my hair from its roots. There are so many different alloys, mixtures, strengths, purities, properties, and toxicity variables that choosing the 'right' one is a painstaking and convoluted endeavor.
Recently looking into platinum, after foraging through hundreds of pages of journals, reports, tests, articles, and personal experiences, I thought I had stumbled upon a good safe alloy in 95% Platinum 5% Ruthenium mix, only to find an obscure article by Jurgen Maerz (the godfather of platinum-smithing), which I am sure 99.999999% of jewelers don't even know exists, where he states that when exposed to the oxygen during heating will form Ruthenium Oxide which is not only toxic to humans, it creates a mutagen that will attack and change the DNA structure of our cells! Ruthenium in the blood stream mimics Iron, and our bodies will naturally bond it to our cells, and most prominently in our bones and bone marrow where it will remain for the remainder of our lifetimes.
'All ruthenium compounds should be regarded as highly toxic and as carcinogenic. Compounds of ruthenium stain the skin very strongly. It seems that ingested ruthenium is retained strongly in bones. Ruthenium oxide, RuO₄, is highly toxic and volatile, and to be avoided.' http://www.lenntech.com/periodic/elements/ru.htm)

We are not a Luxury jeweler, we are a Quality jeweler

The Abbey is not a luxury jeweler, in fact the Abbey doesn't even exist to sell jewelry.

For some reason, the greatest aspiration of many jewelry stores is to become a 'Luxury' jeweler; a jeweler of the stars, the rich and famous, people who know people. I see it everywhere. In store ads, brands, magazines, even the type of jewelry products being pushed to be consumed. There are all sorts of ranges of luxury jewelry out there: in watches you have a range from Gigantto to Rolex to Patek Philippe, and everything in between from every 'Luxury' purveyor in the world out there: Louis Vuitton, Prada, Mont Blanc, even Juicy Couture. I see the term popping up in the mall jewelers, big jewelers, even the small mom and pop jewelers. Luxury has become all consuming in our culture, and quite frankly it makes me feel queasy.

Our society has placed such a high level of importance on luxury that life for many have transferred the focus of their lives from living to acquiring, the more the luxurious the better. No longer is luxury the icing on the cake of life, the people who market and profit from it want a bowl of icing to be eaten three times a day, and they have the audacity to call it a balanced meal.

The Abbey is not a luxury jeweler. I did not create the Abbey to sell jewelry. That's right, I will repeat that again so it will echo forever and be ingrained within the very foundation of the soul of the Abbey: We are not a luxury jeweler and we are not here to sell jewelry.

The Abbey exists to give life. To create, to love, to capture within metal and stones the essence life. Love taught me the greatest virtue achievable in this life is compassion: in which the suffering of others drives and gives an active desire to alleviate it.