Engraving That Endures

Nov 30, 2018.Castro Smith said he believed that he was headed for a career in computer game design when he spotted an advertisement for an engraving apprenticeship in Hatton Garden, the historic center of London's jewelry trade His one-of-a-kind engraved signet rings are much in demand at Dover Street Market, the London shopping emporium beloved by the art and fashion set.

Mr Smith is one of a number of contemporary jewelers who have given the ancient art of hand engraving new life at a time when the craft is increasingly threatened by improved machinery and laser engraving, and there are fewer apprentices entering the trade than ever before "Engraving is one of the noblest art forms and it has been treasured ever since antiquity," the jewelry historian Vivienne Becker said in a phone interview.

No matter his success in the field, Mr Smith said the practice of seal engraving, a resilient form with deeper cuts better suited to the wear of a ring than surface engraving, was primarily a means for him to express his creativity Mr.

Smith said that his team of nine engravers and one goldsmith had created pieces for clients from as far afield as the United States, Mongolia and India, and that frequently entire families purchase the same ring Piaget has four in-house engravers who, for example, spent more than 26 hours working on the dozens of gold rods of just one Midnight Sun necklace for the recent Sunlight Escape high jewelry collection. . Source