Friday, February 28, 2014

Wedding Jewelry

The average couple spends around $5800 on the bride's wedding rings. Will she ever get even close to getting that kind of jewelry again?   Well of course she will because he will adore her till he dies, but first he will live to buy her expensive things.  Still, $5800 for her wedding rings is a good start.

After the trip to the jewelers for her rings, she is off to pick out the pieces she will wear on her wedding day and to buy silver jewelry for her bridesmaids as gifts.

The Silver Standard

In April 2011 the price of silver reached an all time high of  $49.76 a troy ounce.  It bounces along, far behind gold, on the world market at a rate of about 1:58

Say you want to melt down your 100 gram silver bracelet.  At todays price of $21.31 an ounce you would have about $75. worth of silver.  The same bracelet in gold would get you $4350....today one gram of gold costs 58 times what one gram of silver costs.

Silver, gold and platinum sell on the commodities market just like soybeans, crude oil and feeder cattle.  These are investments and while most investors don't take possession of their commodities, I do.  And you can, too.

Owning and wearing silver jewelry, and gold jewelry too if you can afford it,  may not be as financially efficient as buying bullion....although it might be....still, it is a fabulously stylish way to invest.

Precious metals...platinum, gold and silver... may be the last hedge against everything that goes bump in the markets and you may as well look gorgeous while being an exquisitely shrewd investor.

Thursday, February 27, 2014

Fantasy Jewelry

It doesn't happen often but sometimes nothing but a tiara will do. 

Night jewelry.

Wednesday, February 26, 2014

Street Jewelry

Office Jewelry, Corner Office


Hello upper management.  Your jewelry says, I'm your next CEO, I'm dead serious, and by the way, although  I didn't get here on my looks, I'm absolutely gorgeous and I know how to accessorize.

      Photos and descriptions.

You can afford the best jewelry and you buy it.  It's the highest quality.  It's restrained and understated.  You rule.

Office Jewelry, Casual Friday

Today is fun jewelry day. We're not wild but we're still highly spirited.  We are, after all, classy.  Here's the line up for edgy Fridays. 

Photos and descriptions


Disclaimer:  I am not a licensed dress code practitioner.  Always refer to your company manual before getting dressed for work. I'm just covering my gorgeous behind here.

Monday, February 17, 2014

Taxco Time

We spent some Houston traffic, customs and airport time yesterday, crept along in the runway queue, then there was the flight time.  Now the big airport in Mexico City was coming at us and the plane sits itself down on ancient Aztec turf.. 

The bus ride to Taxco from Mexico City is horrible (see previous things-I-fear-that-never-happen post, regarding buses and cars somersaulting and bouncing their way to oblivion).  Now Taxco is coming at us.  Yet another safe landing. 

It's taken nine hours to get here from Houston.  I would have spent nine days to get here, to this mountain side and to the silver.

Now we start Taxco time.  Let's just all slow down. 

Friday, February 14, 2014

Cat Burglars and Finders/Keepers

Someone, somewhere is wearing my 150 gram sterling silver, Maguey bracelet with the Spratling hallmark, a piece of art if ever there was one.  That someone isn't me. It's only jewelry, but I cherished it. 

I lost a Spratling bracelet some years ago and I hope that whoever found it loves it as I did.  It fell off my wrist and I imagine someone, joyful and appreciative picking it up from the restaurant floor, slipping it on her own wrist and knowing pure pleasure.

I bought that chunky, but oh so sweet masterpiece at the old Spratling ranch, a short drive out of Taxco de Alarcon.  It was a perfectly executed piece of jewelry.  Perfectly.  It was made by Don Thomas, brilliant old Maestro with trembling hands. I loved it for years.  And it's gone.

Over at www.stolenswissdiamond.com  I may get some sympathy.  They are offering a $1,000,000 reward for a flawless heart shaped 17.48 carat diamond.  You don't leave a piece like that on the sink of a public restroom so I assume there was a cat burglar and a cracked safe somewhere in the mix. Major heist.

But it's only jewelry.



Saturday, February 8, 2014

Francisco Garcia, Revolutionary

Last night the Alhondiga opened it's scarred, creaking doors to me.  And the hundred or so really well dressed jewelry aficionados who were gathered with me on it's front steps. The Alhondiga  is the embattled fortress built in 1796 in Guanajuato that that now houses the Museo Regional de Guanajuato Alhondiga de Granaditas.  But never mind all that. 

History can be scary, and anyway, we weren't there to remember ancient battles, but to check out the design revolution sparked by metalsmith and design zealot, Francisco Garcia.

We were there for the launching of Garcia's exquisitely unique jewelry, his latest collection of necklaces, earrings, bracelets and rings.  We were there for his champagne and his prosciutto, his classical music soundtrack and the trips back through his exhibition, to see again and again those stellar pieces of his.

Silver Nina will post photos of his incendiary masterpieces soon, bronze breast plates, copper and silver medallions, some burnished to a soft fire, others more like bombs bursting in air.
 Carolyn in Mexico