December 2017
Keshi pearls, diamond, sapphire, sterling silver

My wife can a difficult woman to shop or design for—she has her own strong aesthetic, and she sees everything that leaves my bench so she has a high bar of expectation.

One summer she accompanied me on a pearl-buying expedition and fell in love with two styles of pearls she didn't know existed: baroque and keshi pearls. Since the keshi pearls fit better with my own maker aesthetic, I held on to this decided to make her a necklace for the holidays using those, particularly noting she'd been enamoured of the naturally silver-colored pearls we saw. Since she likes the unusual, I continued the theme by getting glittery gray rough diamond beads to put between the pearls, and then used tiny genuine sapphire seed beads I happened to have to space them all out. I finished it off with a silver-clad magnetic clasp that blends in well with the silver keshi pearls. A truly exceptional and unusual choker for an exceptional and unusual woman.