About

I make jewelry by hand in Jerusalem. Every piece that leaves this studio was carved, cast, set and finished here, by me.

Where it started

I was born in Jerusalem, the youngest of ten. We lived in a one-bedroom apartment, and I spent my time walking in the mountains, reading, and drawing. My early sketches followed the flowing lines of Art Nouveau. My father worked with his hands, and from him I learned to respect a material before trying to shape it.

At 28 I went to Jaipur. I stayed three years, working in the gem markets and the jewelry workshops, learning the trade from people who had been doing it their whole lives. That is where drawing became jewelry.

The years at the bench

From 2002 to 2013 I was head designer at a leading Israeli jewelry house. Pieces I designed there took first place three times at Centurion and three times at Couture in Las Vegas.

In this industry an award is entered under the name of the house rather than the designer who drew the piece. That is simply how it works. After eleven years I wanted a studio where the work and the name were the same thing, so in 2014 I opened my own.

How I work

I start with the stone. A pearl, a rough diamond, a piece of raw mineral, whatever is in front of me that day. I do not draw a design and then look for a stone to fill it.

The gold is carved in wax around the stone itself, so the setting follows the shape that already exists rather than forcing the stone into a standard mount. That is why no two pieces come out identical, and why a baroque pearl that another workshop would reject is usually the one I want.

I work in 18K and 14K gold, with precious and semi-precious stones and natural pearls.

The gold

About 90 percent of the gold I use is recycled, refined from old jewelry. Gold does not degrade, so there is no reason to pull new metal out of the ground when what already exists can be melted and used again. It costs me nothing in quality and it is the right way to work.

Now

I live in Jerusalem with my wife Lital and our four children. I went to the markets of Jaipur to learn this trade, and I came back to work a few minutes from the oldest market I know. The landscape here still does most of the work on my behalf, and I am still at the bench most days.

If you want something made for you, start here.