Life Limits

I’m often asked if we guarantee our jewelry. Of course we do; but it’s an odd question
in that those who ask it usually have little idea of what is customarily guaranteed.
In point of fact, they often confuse a guarantee with insurance; and nothing
could be farther from reality. If a gem falls out of a new ring and there has been no
obvious damage to it, virtually every legitimate jeweler will replace it. If, on the
other hand, the ring is bent and/or broken as a result of some misadventure, it’s
time to file an insurance claim, as no guarantee will cover accidental damage.
Wear and tear is another issue. In general, jewelry guarantees, just like automotive
guarantees, cover the quality of manufacture, but not ‘wear and tear’. What seems
to escape many jewelry owners is that the more a piece of jewelry is worn, the
more likely it is that it will require some kind of maintenance or repair.

A couple of weeks ago one of our clients realized that she’d not had her diamond
ring reappraised (for purposes of insurance) for 25 years. She’d worn it every day
of those years; and in the cheerful conviction that it was ‘indestructible’, she had
never had it inspected. While it was true that none of the 22 small diamonds with
which it was set had fallen out, she was somewhat surprised to learn that she had
managed to break 5 of them. This complicated her desire to insure the ring since
insurers will not insure something that is already broken. Her ‘good news’ was
that the value of the large diamond in the ring had tripled over the last quarter century;
so it was obvious to her that she should have the ring restored and insure it.
I’d love to say that this is an unusual story; but such is far from the case.

Saturday a somewhat perplexed woman, on the sunny side of 50, came into our
store with two rings in need of repair. She couldn’t quite understand why they
might need service as ‘you (meaning our store) ‘had just repaired them.’ Given
their scarred, worn, dirty and broken condition, this was hard to swallow; and a little
research revealed that the last time we’d worked on one ring was 17 years ago.
The other had been in our care more recently, 10 years ago. The first ring was the
more seriously damaged. It had been bent into an oval and had cracked thus allowing
2 of the small diamonds in the ring to fall out. The other ring also had damage
that had resulted in the loss of a diamond; and in neither instance had she any idea
of when the damage might had occurred. What she did not appear to realize was
that jewelry should be worn with some care.

Then there is the crew of cheery watch assassins who come to see us on a regular
basis. Once again, like automotive warrantees watch warrantees cover initial
manufacture, only. Yet in a sort of mechanical Darwinism, these intrepid watch
testers (most usually men) have defined the limits of abusive wear. Broken or
scratched crystal? Many are surprised that the crystal over the face of the watch is
not ‘guaranteed’; nor do they seem to understand that the face of the watch and its
movement (the works) are connected. A cracked or broken crystal leaks dirt and
moisture, both of which will damage the movement and void the guarantee. Yet
the relentlessly careless watch wearer regularly ignores damage to the crystal,
wears the watch and then registers surprise when it stops functioning. Happily,
though alarmingly common, jewelry and watch assassins are in the minority.

Last week one of our clients brought in a family heirloom pocket watch for inspection.
It was a bit over 100 years old and though the 14 Kart gold case that encompassed
its movement was a bit worn, it still worked well and was in over-all beautiful
condition. In like manner, Saturday I had the opportunity to inspect a couple of
pieces of jewelry that one of our clients had inherited. The first was a beautiful
handmade platinum, rock crystal and diamond brooch. Judging by the style of the
diamond cutting, the mode of fabrication and the clasp, I think it to be ‘Edwardian’.
That means it’s about 100 years old; yet it shows negligible wear. That
doesn’t mean it was never worn. Unlike the ‘tragedy‘ ridden pieces of jewelry
above, it was worn with care.

The lives of both great jewelry and great romances are limited by the need for care
and maintenance. Usually you take care of your romance by paying attention to
the one you love; but sometimes life gets so hectic that you lose the communication.
It doesn’t have to happen; and when you buy her a great diamond it won’t.
We know diamonds and we care about their emotional value. We hand select them
for beauty you can be proud of; and unlike jewelers who care little about beauty,
we even offer Hearts On Fire, the world’s most perfectly cut diamond. Perfection
in cut yields perfect beauty - fire and sparkle worthy of your great romance.
Check us out on line at hurstsberwynjewelers.com, then phone us at 708.788.0880
for a ‘maintenance’ appointment. We’re Hursts’ Berwyn Jewelers, not a common
jeweler.

P.S. If you have diamonds or broken or unworn pieces of jewelry that you would
like to sell, come in and we’ll help you establish their market value; and perhaps,
we’ll make the best offer to buy them.

IT’S THE THOUGHT THAT COUNTS

A young woman who had been recently divorced came into our store several days ago attempting to sell her no longer desired engagement and wedding rings. I replied that we rarely buy jewelry “over-the-counter”; but I offered to look at them to see if we might be interested in a trade. Even though most of the diamonds offered to us are far below our standards for generic gems (the stuff you see everywhere, not our exquisitely crafted, incredibly rare and exclusive Hearts On Fire diamonds), we do accept diamonds in trade if they can be re-cut to meet our exacting standards. After cleaning hers, however, it was clear we couldn’t offer any of her diamonds to our clients. The center diamond in her engagement ring had a durability threatening crack in it and her smaller diamonds were filled with visible inclusions - characteristics that should have made them relatively cheap to purchase, but not our cup of tea. Somehow this revelation seemed to give her a rough kind of satisfaction, since it seemed to say that her ex-husband had not seen enough worth in their marriage to invest much in symbols of it. After she left I found myself musing over the difference between “worth” and “value”.

When women (and men) speak of family jewelry they’ve inherited, it’s obvious that the worth they find in it is emotional; while its intrinsic (market) value is often ‘interesting’, but usually of secondary importance. Just to check into my impressions, I looked into my “American Heritage Dictionary” for common usage distinctions between “value” and “worth.” Therein ‘value’ is defined as “an amount of goods, services or money considered to be a fair and suitable equivalent for something else.” Despite the fact that this definition makes me feel as if I’ve had a sudden encounter with the legal profession, it seems pretty clear to me that (usually) when we speak of something’s “value”, we speak of something that can somehow be quantified in the market place. By contrast, the first definition my dictionary offered for “worth” was, “the quality of something that renders it desirable, useful or valuable,” clearly meaning that determinations of “worth” can be far more subjective than determinations of value. The young woman who sought to rid herself of the symbols of her shattered marriage was simply trying to say, “They are without worth to me.” In like manner, the widower who had me size his late wife’s well worn wedding ring so that he could wear it in her memory was trying to say, “She was worth everything to me;” and so it is that jewelry “speaks”.

The question, then, for the jewelry buyer should always be one of worth. If you are buying a piece of jewelry for yourself, it should say what you want it to say to yourself and others. If you are buying a piece of jewelry as a gift, it should say what you want it to say to the recipient. Unfortunately, many who buy a piece of jewelry as a gift confuse worth and value, a path loaded with pitfalls.  One has to become an authority on jewelry metals and modes of manufacture if one is to know the value of the piece of jewelry one is buying; and diamonds are even worse. It’s true there are a technicalities that can be “mastered” by the neophyte gem buyer, but most of them bear only on a gem’s rarity.  Rarity certainly does bear on a gem’s market value, its price, but these technicalities are “laboratory” values that do not by themselves enhance a gem’s beauty - the clearest statement of worth. Think about that for a moment. When given as a gift, the worth of a gem is emotional; it comes from within the giver and his or her relationship to the recipient. Its value as a negotiable asset is very secondary at best. It is its beauty that says what you want it to say, and its worth is forever established by the emotions tied to it. In a nutshell, it’s the thought that counts.

Put yourself in the moment before you buy a gift. A dozen roses may mean as much at that moment, because they are beautiful, as something of 10 times their value. The drawback, of course, is that roses are perishable whereas jewelry is not. Beautiful jewelry will make the moment last; and if it is a moment that should be shared forever, fine jewelry has no peer. This is what makes gifts of engagement rings, wedding rings, anniversary rings, and all the other gifts of fine jewelry that can mark one of life’s great moments, so important. They can be there every day for the rest of the recipient’s life, a constant reminder of your love. So check out our website, hurstsberwynjewelers.com, for our fine jewelry collection; then phone us at 708.788.0880 for an appointment to select a piece of fine jewelry, particularly a beautiful diamond, that will speak for you perfectly and lastingly. We’re Hursts’ Berwyn Jewelers, not a common jeweler.

P.S. If you have diamonds or broken or unworn pieces of jewelry that you would like to sell, come in and we’ll help you establish their market value; and perhaps, we’ll make the best offer to buy them.