A bit like the saying “how long is a piece of string?”, it all depends…

The costs can be split into three broad areas, materials, labour and then everything else.

Materials - Metals

This is where most costs occur. All precious metals are expensive, but some significantly more than others. The metals I work in tend to be silver and gold, silver is less expensive than gold and is a good option if budgets are tight but gold has some significant advantages.

Gold and silver come in different “strengths”, almost all precious metals are alloyed with other metals to make them workable.

For silver there is Sterling Silver (92.5% pure), and Fine Silver (99.9% pure). Whilst Fine Silver may sound better it is generally too soft to be useable for items such as rings, etc and for these generally Sterling Silver tends to be used. The exception to this is for plate silver items such as the little raised cups (tumlings) I make, for these I tend to use Britannia Silver (94.8% pure), as it is a little softer than Sterling.

 

Gold makes silver look simple as there are several options for purity. Purity of gold is measured in carats (or karats if you are from the US), common purity values you may see are 9ct, 18ct, 22ct, with 10ct and 14ct being common in the US and some European countries. The higher the carat number the purer the gold:

• 9ct gold – generally the hardest alloy, it contains 37.5% gold. It is very good for rings and parts of designs which need strength (pendant bails etc). Seen by some as the cheap option, and has a slightly lighter colour than 18ct. Its downside is it is harder to work and may not be suitable for some designs.

• 18ct gold – the higher standard in the UK, wonderful to work with as it is malleable and strong enough to be used in fine detail parts of designs without worry.

I can work in the other carats but in general most gold jewellery is made from these two purities. For KeumBoo I use 23.9ct gold foil, but this is the only time pure gold is generally used.

All of the purities are available in yellow, white and red or rose colour. In addition I can mix colours to give non-traditional colours such as yellowish gold which looks like a very creamy white gold. One point to note though is I do not rhodium plate pieces, most “white gold” jewellery seen in High Street jewellers is white gold which has then been plated. It starts out very shiny and white but over time it looses the shine and yellows – this is the rhodium wearing off, white gold is actually a creamy white which has a lovely depth.

As there is a significant price difference between gold and silver for commissions you may want to consider mixing small amounts of gold into a silver design – there are many examples on my website.

For commissions in gold I will give an estimate cost but as prices fluctuate frequently I will need to requote if the commission is not taken up within 14 days. To see how much it fluctuates follow this link, this is the market value of pure gold and does not include refining, alloying, processing costs which increase its costs.

 

Materials - Gemstones

 

The other significant part of the materials costs tends to be gemstones. In general the “Big 4” Diamonds, Rubies, Emeralds and Sapphires - will cost a lot of money for something sizeable and of good quality. There are a huge number of different gemstones available and in general one of my suppliers can find what is needed.

 

The two main factors which affect gem cost (apart from being one of those mentioned above) is size and quality.

• Size – this is measured in carats (not the same carats as gold – just to be confusing!) regardless of stone, in general the bigger it is the more expensive it is, this is due to larger stones being harder to source. This is where the material it is made of is important, a 1ct diamond will be the same size as a 1ct moissanite but one with cost £000s and the other £00s.

• Quality – this is probably more important than size. A 6mm long pear shaped low quality pink sapphire will look very different to a high quality one. The quality of the stone depends on many factors:

o   the internal quality of the stone - does it have fissures or flaws internally

o   the quality of the cut – high quality hand cut stones generally cost more than machine cut stones – are the facets even, well spaced, is the final polish of good quality

o   the depth of colour – some stones are naturally richer in colour

o   has it been treated? A lot of gemstones have been treated, either heat treated, oil filled, layered with other materials. Treatment in general is not a bad thing and is common in a lot of stones such as sapphires, rubies and emeralds it is not a problem as long as it is made clear to the purchaser and the price reflects accordingly.

Overall I tend to use stones other than the Big 4, with the exception of sapphires which I do use a lot, however the sapphires I use tend to be Australian part sapphires which are not the traditional blue, but can be any colour from blue to green and may be more than one colour in one stone.

 

I also use lab grown stones – these are considered “fake” by a lot of jewellers, but they have their benefits. They have significantly less impact on the environment as they are created not mined, and they are generally much clearer and richer in quality of colour than the natural variant, also they are significantly cheaper. Lab grown rubies, diamonds and moissanite are chemically and structurally identical to the pure form of their natural equivalent. I will always identify and describe if stones are lab grown.

 

Labour costs

The next big cost after materials is my time, both in design and creating pieces. Any initial discussions are done on a free basis, but from that point onward costs in time and materials are incurred.

Everything I make is handmade by me, in my studio. Handmaking jewellery is a time consuming process and the complexity of the design will have a significant impact on the cost. A few things to consider include:

• Will it be made up of multiple pieces or just a single piece, will it be a set? Earings are paired and matched – this takes time.

• Will it contain gemstones? If so, what setting is desired? Flush, claw, pave, etc all take different amounts of time to complete.

• Will it contain moving elements?

• Is it large? Larger pieces tend to take longer to make.

All these factors will have a significant impact of how long it will take, as a result a very complex silver piece might end up being more expensive than a simple gold piece. The same is true of reworking sentimental pieces, frequently the time required to dismantle the piece, and rework it is the same as making a piece from entirely new materials, many people are surprised by this.

 Everything else…

 

There are some additional costs which every piece incurs:

• Hallmarking – All my pieces are hallmarked, the Law allows for some not to be (anything silver under 7.78g, gold under 1g) however unless there is a good reason I prefer to hallmark everything I make. I have a separate article all about hallmarking here. One point to note though is that for pieces with mixed metal such as silver and gold the Assay Office will only mark it for silver+gold not the other way round (the marks are different) and they will not mark silver and white gold as silver+gold as it is not identifiable which is which to the untrained eye.

• Postage – Everything I make is dispatched Royal Mail Special Delivery with the appropriate amount of insurance, for an individual piece this means 3 sets of postage (from me to the Assay Office and back and then to you)

• Workshop overheads – small costs mount up – solder (especially gold solder is expensive), propane and oxygen (for torches), workshop consumables (saw blades, burrs, etc), website/online costs. All of these are paid for by a small charge for each project.

  
  

A couple of examples of pieces I made recently:

 

Both of these rings are sandcast using Cornish sand, the main difference is the gem costs and the amount of time taken for setting, highlighting that whilst gems and metals increase price so does workshop bench time.

So that is how everything stacks up in the world of commissions and bespoke jewellery. I hope this helps and removes some of the concerns around cost.

 

There are many factors which influence the final cost and all of these are taken in to account when I put together an estimate. I always try to make a piece as close as possible to the estimate costs, and should anything change this will always be communicated.