Quoted the way jewellery should be quoted
Metal weight, stone weight and making charge on every ticket, separately. Made on the premises in Gopalapuram — you can watch it happen.
The number that matters on a ticket
Our making charge, fixed and printed, where the trade norm is a percentage of the metal value.
Our signature pieces
Four ways through the case. The last is the one most people actually come for.
The pieces we remake most often
Jhumkas, thin bangles and the plain solitaire setting. These are the only designs we repeat, and we repeat them because people keep asking rather than because they carry the best margin.
Nine pieces finished this quarter
Each made once. When one sells we do not repeat it, which means the photograph on this page is of the actual piece rather than of a sample.
Stones bought as single lots
Whatever is on the tray is all there will be. We will tell you plainly which stones in a lot are lab-grown and what that does to the price, before you ask.
Everything under forty thousand
Small hoops, studs and chains. The half of the business nobody photographs, and the half that pays for the bench.
Made here, by two people whose names are on the ticket
Everything sold under this name is made on the first floor of this building by Suresh and Vinod, who have been at that bench for twenty-six and nineteen years. Nothing is bought in and resold, which sounds like a low bar and is not — most of what is sold as an atelier’s own work in this city is trade-made and marked up. The making charge is eight per cent, flat and printed, where the norm is fourteen to twenty-five per cent of the metal value, which quietly rises every time gold does.
A commission, start to finish
Six to ten weeks. You see it twice before it is finished.
Conversation and drawing
An hour at the bench, a hand drawing and a written quotation itemising metal, stones and making. No charge, and roughly one in four does not proceed past it.
Wax and approval
A carved wax you hold and turn over. Changes here cost nothing; changes after casting cost a great deal, which is why this stage is not skipped even when a client is in a hurry.
Casting and setting
Cast, filed and set on the premises. Stones are shown to you loose, under a loupe, before they go in — with the certificate for anything above thirty points.
Finishing and hallmark
Polished, hallmarked and the HUID recorded on your invoice. The invoice repeats the weights from the quotation so the two can be compared.
From the tray
Recent pieces, most of them one-offs.
Buying, and what to ask anyone selling you gold
The first two questions are the ones that decide the price.
What is a making charge and why does yours differ?
It is the labour, and the trade almost always quotes it as a percentage of the metal value — so it rises every time gold does, for the same work. Ours is a flat eight per cent, printed on the quotation. Ask any jeweller for theirs as a rupee figure rather than a percentage and watch what happens.
Will you buy it back?
Yes, at the day’s gold rate less two per cent, in writing on the invoice. We do not buy back stones at what you paid, and nobody honestly does — a stone sells at trade value on return, which is typically forty to sixty per cent of retail. That is worth knowing before you buy rather than when you sell.
Is everything hallmarked?
Everything above two grams, with the HUID recorded on your invoice so it can be checked against the BIS register. Anything below that is stamped and stated as unhallmarked on the ticket.
Do I need an appointment?
Not to browse. For a commission or anything above about two lakh, yes — the tray comes out of the safe and one of the goldsmiths sits with you, and neither happens on a walk-in Saturday.