Roseate Bloom Ring

A rose seen from directly above, at the moment it opens completely. Marquise diamonds radiate from the centre as petals do — pointed at either end, fullest through the middle, which is the shape a petal already has. They are set at graduating heights, so the flower rises from the finger rather than resting flat upon it, and the light moves across the tiers as the hand turns.

At the heart of it, a natural pink sapphire of 3.26 carats from Afghanistan.

Afghanistan is among the smallest sources of fine pink sapphire in the world. Almost everything reaching the market comes from Madagascar, Sri Lanka or East Africa; Afghan material appears occasionally and in very modest quantity, which is the first thing that makes this stone uncommon.

Pink sapphire and ruby are the same mineral, separated only by how far the colour travels. Chromium produces both. Here it has produced a pink of real intensity, carried evenly right through the body of the stone rather than gathering in the table alone.

And it is clean. Chromium-coloured corundum grows with a great deal going on inside it, so clarity at this level and this weight is the whole of the find — the stone is crystalline throughout, and light passes from one side to the other without interruption. That transparency is what allows the colour to read as brightly as it does.

It is set in platinum, and deliberately so. Platinum is a cool, entirely neutral white: it returns nothing of its own colour to the stone, so the pink arrives at the eye exactly as it left the gem. It also holds fine claws under tension better than any other metal, which is what permits a setting this delicate around a stone this important.

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