The ring from the front: the oval cabochon amethyst in the silver bezel and the eight coloured stones on gold prongs all around

Collection Marte·Anello

Marte ring in oxidized silver and gold with oval cabochon amethyst and eight colored stones

Eight colored stones on gold claws around an oval cabochon amethyst, on nineteen grams of oxidized silver.

€760,00 A950pv

Drawn and built by hand at the bench, in Tosi.

At the center an oval cabochon amethyst: no facets, a smooth dome in which the purple reads in bands — one part almost transparent, one solid — and the veining stays visible beneath the polished surface. It is closed by a silver setting with a shaped rim, held by four grains. All the rest is oxidized silver, opened into irregular voids that widen and narrow without ever repeating: black in the recesses, pale on the edges. It is not a band, it is a mass that rises into a dome above the finger and carries on pierced down the sides as well. On the silver, at different heights and without forming a ring, sit eight small stones, each on its own yellow gold claws: one green, one yellow, one blue, one pale pink, two magenta, one purple and one blue-violet.

The silver at nine hundred and twenty-five thousandths weighs nineteen grams and five, and makes the whole body; the yellow gold at eighteen carats is one gram and sixteen — sixteen times less — and sits only in the eight seats of the colored stones. The stones around it are citrine quartz, peridot, rose amethyst, blue topaz and rhodolite, and each has its seat opened by hand at a different point of the piercing, where the solid metal widens just enough to carry it. The amethyst at the center is not faceted: cut as a dome it gives back no sparkle but the color whole, and that is why it holds its own against eight smaller stones without disappearing.

The material

Weights and carats as the workshop declares them.

19,05 gramsSilver 925‰
1,16 gramsYellow gold 18kt 750‰
Metals
Silver 925‰ and yellow gold 18kt 750‰
Technique
Made by hand. Silver body opened into irregular voids, oxidized in the recesses and re-polished on the relief; amethyst setting in silver; the eight colored stones set one at a time on yellow gold claws, at different heights across the piercing.

The stones

Amethyst

At the center, in the silver setting

Cut
Oval cabochon
Note
Natural amethyst

Citrine quartz

Among the eight colored stones around it, in gold claw settings

Peridot

Among the eight colored stones around it, in gold claw settings

Pink amethyst

Among the eight colored stones around it, in gold claw settings

Blue topaz

Among the eight colored stones around it, in gold claw settings

Rhodolite

Among the eight colored stones around it, in gold claw settings

Three-quarter view from above: the silver body cut with irregular openings running down to the band
Foreshortened view: how wide the head of the ring spreads above the finger
The ring tilted back: the dome of the amethyst seen edge-on
Side view: the height to which the bezel rises above the band
The side: the openings cross the metal right through and it can be seen through
The opposite side: peridot, citrine quartz and the other stones set at different heights on the silver
The ring resting on a branch: the contrast between the black recesses and the re-polished raised parts
Three-quarter view on wood: the gold prongs that close one by one over the coloured stones
Close-up: the veins inside the amethyst, readable under the polished dome
The ring on the finger: the real size of the head on the hand
On the finger, in three-quarter view: how far the ring projects beyond the outline of the hand
On the finger, from the front: how the purple of the amethyst reads in daylight

How it is made

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

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 mesh comes out crooked, but that at some point the solid metal is left too thin, and the piece gives at exactly that spot. 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 carry.
Oxidizing
The silver is darkened deliberately, and then re-polished only where the light has to come back. The black stays in the voids and the recesses, the pale on the raised work: it is a design made by subtraction, and whoever does it decides where to stop the cloth.
Gold and silver on the same piece
Silver melts at a lower temperature than gold and oxidizes quickly under the flame. Mounting 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 gets closed in under the gold.
Cabochon cut
No facets: the stone is roughed out and polished to a continuous dome. It is not the easiest cut, it is the cut that hides least — on a smooth surface every undulation reads with the naked eye, while among facets it is lost. And the light does not come back as sparkle: it goes in, passes through the thickness and comes back up carrying the color with it, so what you look at is the color and not the fire.
Amethyst
Amethyst is purple quartz, and the purple does not come from a pigment: it comes from a few iron atoms that ended up in the lattice in place of silicon and were then struck by the natural radiation of the rock. That is why the color is almost never laid on evenly — it arranges itself in zones and bands, heavier on one side and paler on the other — and orienting the stone properly under the wheel is exactly what spreads it. It is as hard as citrine, the seventh degree, and can be worn every day without worrying about scratches; but that purple is the most delicate thing it has. Strong continuous light fades it, and heat erases it altogether: an amethyst heated enough turns yellow, and that is how much of the citrine on the market is born. Purple once lost does not come back.

I don't look at what others are doing: I would rather create in my own style. That is what makes our jewelry recognizable.

Fabio Gori — Anna Gioielli, Tosi

Made for you

Every ring is made in the size of the person who will wear it: we settle it together before the work begins.

The goldsmith's workshop is also the place where made-to-measure jewellery is created and family pieces are restored: if you have an idea, or something you want brought back to how it was, that is where it starts.

Ask for a made-to-measure piece
Made by
Anna Gioielli

A goldsmith's workshop in Tosi, on the slopes of the Pratomagno: Anna opened it in 1988, her sons Fabio and Francesco carry it on. Piercing, repoussé, chasing and burin engraving — the Florentine school, with the workshop in full view of the shop.

All the creations by Anna Gioielli

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