Kevin & Owen

Kevin approached Wedding Rings Direct with a bespoke enquiry last year after getting engaged to his partner, Owen. Owen is an interior designer who also works in glass jewellery design and Kevin is a pharmacist by day but is also an artist in his spare time. Due to the couple's creative nature, they knew that they wanted to play a part in designing their wedding rings.

They are both fond of uncomplicated designs but they agreed that they would also like an understated touch of sparkle. Kevin and Owen started by using our sample service which allowed them to try on silver replica rings in different widths, depths and profiles. By trying on samples in different specifications they came to realise that they liked the idea of quite heavy rings with a chunky profile. When it came to choosing their metal they  had decided that white gold or platinum was a little too plain for their liking but also found yellow gold to be a little too brash. They really loved the idea of the subtle copper tones of rose gold.

Once they had a brief for their wedding rings, the design process began. Kim, our in-house designer, proceeded to create a series of CAD images based on the ideas that Kevin and Owen had given her.

Once the final designs had been chosen, Kevin and Owen asked their friend who is a diamond merchant to help them to source the diamonds that would be set into their rings. Kevin chose a yellow radiant cut diamond for his ring whilst Owen went for a white emerald cut diamond. Emerald and radiant cut diamonds are both rectangular and have similar profiles, but there are differences in the way that light is refracted within them due to the specific way that they are cut.

Resin masters of the rings were created using a technology called Rapid prototyping. Rapid Prototyping is the process where CAD drawings are bought into physical reality using 3D printing. Moulds were then produced from these resin masters and Kevin and Owen's rings were then cast in these moulds in rose gold.

The rough castings were then cleaned up and holes were cut out of the metal for the diamonds. The diamonds were then set into the rings using a bridge setting. Kevin and Owen had originally liked the idea of having a tension setting which is when the diamond is suspended between two pieces of metal and held in place simply with tension. Unfortunately this particular setting wouldn't have worked with their desired design and so we ended up going with a bridge setting as this has a similar appearance but is actually much more secure as the diamond sits with metal behind the stone as well as to the sides.

When the finished rings arrived, Kevin and Owen were absolutely delighted. Kevin actually decided to later change his yellow radiant diamond to a white emerald cut to match Owen's as he felt that yellow diamond didn’t compliment the rose gold as much as the white diamond in Owens ring. We were happy to remove the radiant and set the new emerald cut stone for him. Kevin has since been emailing us with ideas to incorporate his yellow radiant into another piece of jewellery.

“...we were blown away, couldn’t have been happier. From start to finish the process was smooth and hassle-free. I'm a little bit of a control freak so Kim very patiently answered my thousands of emails!”

Kevin and Owen have just bought their first house together and plan to wed in Scotland next year. We wish the happy couple all the best for the future and hope that they continue to get joy from their rings for years to come.