Marte dome-shaped perforated silver ring with freshwater pearl and four six-point diamonds

How it is made

The words of the trade, one by one, explained to those who do not know them.

01

Irregular voids

In geometric piercing the error is measured against the module that repeats; here there is no module, and every void has to be decided as it is opened. The risk shifts: not that a link comes out crooked, but that at some point the solid part is left too thin, and the piece gives way exactly there. Whoever does it holds together two things that pull in opposite directions, an outline that has to look random and a thickness that has to hold.

02

Oxidizing

The silver is darkened on purpose, and then polished back only where the light has to return. The black stays in the voids and the recesses, the light on the raised work: it is a drawing made by subtraction, and whoever does it decides where to stop the cloth.

03

Gold and silver on the same piece

Silver melts at a lower temperature than gold and oxidizes quickly under the flame. Setting the two metals on the same piece means heating just enough for the solder to take without sinking the silver, and cleaning the joint before the black of the flame is sealed in under the gold.

04

Pearl

The pearl is the only gem produced by a living animal, and it is not a mineral like the others: it is aragonite — calcium carbonate — held together by conchiolin, an organic substance the mollusc lays down between one layer and the next. That organic part is its weak point. On the hardness scale a pearl sits around three: it scratches with a fingernail, and the metal of another piece of jewelry marks it at the first contact. But the scratch is not the worst damage: being a carbonate it dissolves in acids, and sweat, perfume, hairspray and vinegar corrode the surface until the sheen goes out. It goes on last, after the perfume, and comes off first; it is cleaned with a barely damp cloth and put away dry, never shut in a bag where no air passes. And the thread or cord that holds it is watched too: it is the part that ages first, and it should be replaced before it gives, not after.

05

Brilliant cut

Fifty-seven facets calculated so that the light entering from above comes back out the same way. It is the cut that makes a diamond sparkle, and the reason a badly cut diamond stays dull.