Diamonds And Natural Stone: November 2011

Backlit Mute Swans

A lunchtime walk along the Embankment in Peterborough.

Mute Swan Cygnus olor

Canon EOS500 70-300mm IS USM

Buy Of The Day | N°21 FW 2011 Cardigan

Everyone Knows By now how Much I Love N°21 By Alessandro Dell'Acqua , His alluring Creativity in Finding The Balance between The world of masculinity and femininity is really amazing ,Alessandro Set The Trend with The First collection in Fall 2010 to his Latest Collection Spring Summer 2012.

Buy of The Day is the lurex Cardigan From N°21 Fall 2011 .Its a straight From the Runway look and Lurex is Very Big this season.The Cardigan gives a masculine appeal worked into a Very feminine fabric and Color ,you can wear it with almost Everything in your closet From skirts, Pants and Dresses.

Buy This Runway Look Here

By R Al Naimi

Winter feeling in Tokyo proper

Oh I just had to take a break from my thesis, and I thought I had better take advantage of this free half hour to blog. Which is something I just don't have time to do recently! TT I also have not been replying to comments or reading blogs, I know how this negatively affects things but I won't be able to interact normally until after my thesis is due haha!

I was also thinking, many of my recent posts aren't so interesting and thought that many people began reading my blog to learn more and enjoy photos of Japan. So I will try to get back on track with Japan write-ups and share some more useful information ^^/

Business areas, like around Tokyo Station, have a western feeling

It will be winter soon, and I don't know about you but we have already put up our Christmas decorations (expect the tree, we haven't had time yet). It makes me feel like showing some winter-y photos of Japan!

Not particularly winter-y but interesting and red like Christmas haha!

Now that's winter-y!

Actually its been years since I was in Japan for Christmas, I honestly really disliked being there for Christmas and regard it as a mistake, so I usually travel in January now. However one great thing about that is many of the illuminations are still up.

January is the month of the New Year of course, which is much more important in Japan than Christmas so there are lots of nice decorations about and events going on. These photos come from a particular night in January earlier this year when I went to the Tokyo Station area to see illuminations.

Beautiful lit up trees

Mostly just got to see the back of heads...

While we were there we also passed through the Oazo shopping center, and happened upon a free opera performance. It was really interesting, but since we didn't know about it beforehand we didn't get a good view haha. There were also some pretty window displays in the mall.

A jewelry display, but its not the jewelry that is beautiful

I know there was not much info in this particular writeup, but hopefully you could enjoy the photos haha. And in case you are in need of some more festive photos, please check out Thanh Thao's post today! It's all Christmas photos from Germany XD

Well that's it for now. I'm off to eat dinner and write some more for my thesis, then shower and bed and then work again...

Muse Winter 2011| " Fire & Ice " Alessandra Ambrosio

We Love " Fire & Ice "Alessandra Ambrosio For Muse Magazine By Chad Pitman

and Styled by Melissa Rubini .

Fun Custom Work

I always enjoy custom making jewelry for my customers and I enjoy the challenge of trying something new or different. But if I am to be completely honest I really like it the most when the customer already likes my style of work and wants me to do something for them that is reflective of that because that is what is most fun for me.

A few months ago a couple who are one of my oldest (in terms of being customers not in terms of age!) customers came in with a pile of diamonds. His mother has been in the process of selling off and passing on her collection to her three children and she had given them a platinum necklace with approximately 360 .15 ct. diamonds in it. The children decided they were each going to make up some jewelry with it to wear at her upcoming birthday party for themselves, and I believe some of their children as well. So my customers had 119 diamonds (almost 20 cts. in total) that they wanted me to play with. They didn't ask me to use all of their diamonds but as many as I thought would work in the suite of jewelry they were commissioning from me. They wanted a pair of earrings, a bracelet, a pin/pendant and a ring. They also picked out some beautiful blue sheen moonstones I had gotten recently to use in the earrings and one for the bracelet.

We discussed general parameters and ideas for the pieces. For the earrings I wanted to do a larger version of something I had done years ago for another customer with a lot of dangling diamonds. The bracelet I thought should be done as separate, unique links with the diamonds on them. For the pendant we looked at a piece I had out in the case with a moonstone in it for a general idea. The ring was a bit different though in that they looked at a regular design I do (http://spirerjewelers.com/gallery/rings/Capture_00115.jpg) but they wanted a waving row of diamonds set into it. Because everything was being hand built from scratch this was a huge job in terms of my time. I started with the earrings and had them look at them before moving on to the next jobs. While I had a pretty good idea of where I was going on the pendant and bracelet, I had no idea what I was actually going to do for the ring until I actually began building it.

What I was happy about with this job (besides the fact that I just really enjoyed making them and the results!) was that I was able to tie in all of the pieces in different ways so that they were both a set but unique items. While you can't see it in the photos there was a distinct stripe of orange through the middle of each of the moonstones (especially visible in the one in the bracelet). This led me to think about things in terms of two sides/designs. So on the bracelet I took the square pieces and cut them in half and set them each up a little differently. If you look closely at the pendant you'll note there is a distinct design shift midway (diagonally) through the piece. The diamonds in the ring created two distinct sides. although the design on either side was similar. I wanted the customers to be able to enjoy them and look at them and see different things going on each time they did. After all that plain old Tiffany style engagement ring is going to look exactly the same no matter how many times you look at it. You'll never see anything new. But no matter how much time you spend with one of these pieces they'll never get boring.

The four pieces are pictured here. I managed to get 103 diamonds into them which I thought was pretty good. They were picked up this morning and I'm happy to say my customers were thrilled (and they said they would write a comment here so I'm hoping they will back me up on that!) Okay, okay so not all of you are fortunate enough to be given 120 diamonds to play with. But even if you only have a few I'm always happy to make something up for you!

Shine On

Muse Magazine
Issue: #27 Fall 2011
Editorial: Shine On
Model: Valerija Kelava
Photographer: Maciek Kobielski
Styling: Joanne Blades

SOURCE for full size images

British Fashion Awards 2011

Sarah Burton, Kate Moss, Alexa Chung, Victoria Beckham, SamCam -- Paris may have couture and New York may have Marc, but it was the Brits who ruled fashion this year.Tonight in London, those names and more gathered for the annual British Fashion Awards, presented by the British Fashion Council (the UK's CFDA equivalent). There were plenty of awards to go around, given the crazy amounts of success British designers and tastemakers have had in 2011.

Sarah Burton took home the top honor as "Designer of the Year" for her work at Alexander McQueen... and, of course, on the Royal Wedding Dress.

Victoria Beckham's win for "Designer Brand of the Year" recognizing her success with her ready-to-wear, handbang and accessories collections, presented to her by Marc Jacobs.

Accessory Designer of the Year went to Charlotte Dellal for Charlotte Olympia, a brand beloved by many celebs including Olivia Palermo. Mary Katrantzou, who won best Emerging Talent in the Womenswear category.

Stella Tennant, who got tongues wagging with an arresting Vogue Italia cover this fall, took home the Model of the Year title.

Designer of the Year: Sarah Burton for Alexander McQueen
Menswear Designer of the Year: Kim Jones
Accessory Designer of the Year: Charlotte Dellal for Charlotte Olympia
Designer Brand of the Year: Victoria Beckham
Model of the Year: Stella Tennant
Emerging Talent, Womenswear: Mary Katrantzou
Emerging Talent, Menswear: Christopher Raeburn
Emerging Talent, Accessories: Tabitha Simmons
New Establishment Award: Christopher Kane
Isabella Blow Award for Fashion Creator: Sam Gainsbury, Gainsbury and Whiting
Red Carpet Award: Stella McCartney, presented by Kate Hudson
Outstanding Achievement in Fashion Award: Sir Paul Smith
British Style Award: Alexa Chung