Look Book

28 www.thejewelrybook.com A LT E R N A T I V E S T Y L E B R I D A L Alternative Aisle Style Wedding jewelry retailers and makers dish on less-traditional design aesthetics that are poised for greater sales. BY JENNIFER HEEBNER While wedding jewelry is the category that many retailers rely on to provide up to a third of annual sales, that doesn't mean that some of its traditions are impervi- ous to change. Areas that The Jewelry Book knows will play an important role in retail- ers' future sales include lab-grown or syn- thetic diamonds and rustic, opaque, and salt-and-pepper diamonds, though more traditional merchants will fi nd familiarity in fancy-shape colorless rocks and stacked bands in mixed metals and motifs. Read on to see what your peers have to say about the possibilities. Lab-grown diamonds. While De Beers' Light- box collection of manmade diamonds fea- tures fashion-forward jewelry, Richline Group retailers, including Macy's and J.C. Penney, are aggressively targeting wedding jewelry shop- pers with its Grown with Love line while Jew- elry Television is seeking out buyers for both fashion and wedding styles. Independent re- tailers, too, see the benefi ts of lab-grown dia- monds, particularly for brides. Travis Kukovich of William Travis Jew- elry in Chapel Hill, N.C., sells upwards of fi ve lab-grown diamonds a month since he initiated sales of them earlier this year, though he'd like to be selling more. "We are pushing these diamonds hard—we think they are the future," he says. "When I'm making pieces for my friends, I tell them this is the way to go." To expedite sales, he drops them into mountings—versus offering them loose, which proved to be a tougher sell—so cli- ents can immediately appreciate them and recognize their value. And for a custom jewelry house like his, where 90 percent of pieces are made in house, the move also helps drive sales of one-of-a-kind settings. Mixed bands in 18k gold with diamonds start at $1,265 retail. Sofi a Kaman, Los Angeles; 310-310-3998; www.sofi akaman.com Hana East-West ring with a champagne-color emerald-cut diamond, $7,200. Erika Winters, Seattle; 310-592-1295; www.erikawinters.com

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