14KT WHITE GOLD ENGRAVED FRAME BOHO ENGAGEMENT RING WITH OVAL BLACK ROSE CUT DIAMOND

THE GREEN LAKE SHOP YOUR CUSTOM DESIGN YOUR GEMSTONE MODEL & CASTING THE JEWELER'S BENCH YOUR FINISHED PIECE

THE GREEN LAKE SHOP

Translating our client’s ideas into beautiful custom jewelry
to celebrate the iconic moments in life since 1996.

Your piece was crafted in the
the Seattle studio

The Seattle shop was our first large scale facility with room for 50+ artists. It includes a state of the art casting and production shop, all visible to the public. The design studio has 14 design stations, private meeting rooms and a full scale coffee and wine bar.

Green Lake Jewelry Works opened its doors on Seattle’s Green Lake Drive in 1996. Since then, its craftspeople have grown to win national recognition for excellence in the art of fine jewelry making with two distinct workshops where each piece is made by hand.

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The flagship Seattle studio is home to all metal casting and a majority of 3D printing technologies for Green Lake Jewelry Works. Its workshop is also home to some of the most talented jewelers in the country, where a tradition of dedicated craftsmanship is passed from masters to journeymen and women.

YOUR CUSTOM DESIGN

Custom jewelry at Green Lake always begins with ideas, inspirations, and a sketch, where the many design elements that make for the perfect ring are discovered through ideation.

Oftentimes, a ring will go through many iterations and changes along the way before the final look is achieved.

DESIGNING YOUR PIECE

Ideas and inspirations used in your project.

DESIGNER

Melissa T

I got my first glimpse into the jewelry world as a kid, earning quarters for spotting tiny melee diamonds on the shop floor and watching in awe as my dad fired up his torch, shaping metal into something magical and meaningful. With a natural artistic streak and love of people, what began as a creative curiosity eventually became a full-time career. I began at Green Lake Jewelry Works as a young adult, spending a decade designing with clients in the Seattle studio. During that time, I mentored new designers, helped shape internal systems, and supported both the creative and operational sides of a fast-growing company. I also earned GIA certifications as a Graduate Diamonds & AJP. My work has been featured in Washington Wedding Day and I have been mentioned in In Store Magazine.

YOUR GEMSTONE

Your gemstone was hand and eye selected from thousands of stones that we view before choosing the finest, most beautiful gems that suit our very choosy designers and clients.
We are as picky about our gems as we are about every other aspect of our work.

GREEN LAKE GEM LAB

Above and Beyond® Gemstones

The Green Lake Gem Lab sources rare stones through a responsible network of globally dispersed miners and reputable traders, and verifies the validity of each gem with sophisticated testing equipment and independent certifications.

DIAMONDS + THE KIMBERLY PROCESS

Green Lake’s collection of diamonds only maintain gems with certifications from the GIA or other internationally recognized laboratories, all with an assurance of the Kimberly Process Certification Scheme — the UN resolution passed in 2000 to ensure ‘conflict diamonds’ do not enter the global supply chain.

ROSECUTS

Green Lake sources much of its collection of rose-cut diamonds from polishers who’ve been producing gems this way within communities of legacy tradesmen since the style’s inception over 500 years ago, in India’s Mughal Empire. Unlike conventional diamond cuts (with deep pavilions and subtle crowns), rose-cuts are flat on the bottom with facets that rise high like a budding flower.

3D MODEL

CAD

Engineering the X, Y, and Z coordinates of a design is not only a way to inform sophisticated milling and growing machines to create a model; they’re also a powerful way to communicate the vision for a ring.

Realistic renderings and physical models help transform sketched ideas into reality in an interplay between the client, the designer and the CAD team, all of whose input and ideas help create something that both looks right and fits perfectly.

The entire Green Lake project team collaborates on each piece, adding nuanced details and subtle improvements to the design, all while making sure that design cohesiveness, stability on the finger, and stone security are perfected.

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INAE
CAD Designer

Bringing your design to life

WAX MODELS

Lost-wax casting is thousands of years old, and it’s how we still cast today. From the increasingly rare skill of carving by hand, to the employment of digitally guided milling machines, blocks of wax are cut down into precise models.

These models are used both for design ideation and adjustment and casting the actual piece.

CASTING

At the workshop, the model was cast in a specialty plaster-like investment and heated to release the wax or resin from its mold, then cast using a specialized induction casting machine from Italy.

CLEANUP & DETAILING

Each ring in a small casting batch shares a common vein of gold or platinum, from where it’s cut and prepared for setting. Rough castings first need to be carefully cleaned and polished before more bench work can be done. Even the inner surfaces are carefully detailed.

100 PERCENT RECYCLED

Green Lake’s use of gold and platinum comes from 100% recycled or certified Fairmined sources. We are one of the nation’s first adopters of recycled casting grain certified by SCS Global Services. Today we return all scrap and unused noble metals for refining in a transparent supply chain.

CRAFTSMANSHIP

All areas of old-world jewelry making are completed in a single workshop. Master gold and platinumsmiths receive rings from casting and set to care for each pieces as a one-of-kind, collaborating with designers to ensure each detail is included.

GEMSTONE SETTING

It required steady hands and confident mastery to set your gemstone for a lifetime of confident wear. Gems can be especially small and terribly rare, so the responsibility for this final stage in crafting a ring falls to our most experienced professionals.

ERIC H
Stonesetter

HAND ENGRAVING

Hand engraving is the pinnacle of the jeweler’s craft, displaying fine artistry in crisp detail. It takes perfectly honed, hardened steel tools, a steady hand and years of dedicated practice to get it right. Green Lake's skilled engravers maintain world class craftsmanship within the increasingly rare art form, of which this piece provides a stunning example.
ERIC H
Hand Engraver

FINAL POLISH

Each custom made item in the Green Lake workshop receives a final polish before it’s carefully inspected and reviewed for standards of excellence. Each project is at last stamped with the Green Lake leaf quality mark before delivery.

YOUR FINISHED PIECE

14kt white gold Engraved Frame Boho Engagement Ring with Oval Black Rose Cut Diamond

Searching for a boho yet classic, detailed yet simple engagement ring with intricate but not overcrowded design details turned out to be much tricker than first expected for this client. So, when he found Green Lake Jewelry Works, he knew he had found the place where he could bring his idea to reality! In addition to the style mashup’s he wanted to incorporate all together, he also wanted to infuse the design with symbolism that was special to him and his beloved. Knowing she was not a traditional “white diamond” kind of gal, he chose a dark bold rose cut black diamond that suited her to a T. With careful communication done entirely via design page from afar, he and his designer worked through each special detail until the ring was just perfect. Once he had the ring in hand, he took to the skies with his love, taking her on the trip of a lifetime. He had carefully coordinated with the airline flight crew to propose, and once at cruising altitude he dropped to one knee while the crew filmed, and afterwards the love birds clinked glasses of bubbles while the pilot announced their engagement to the passengers, and everyone applauded. His fiancé loved the ring so much that she wrote to us saying “Everything he does has symbolism to it! He chose to propose to me on an airplane to represent us traveling together throughout time, and because it doesn’t matter where we are… as long as were together, home is where the heart is”. Sigh… Indeed, it truly it is!

CLIENT IMAGES AND COMMENTS

Each project is designed with and for a specific client, taking into account personal style and preferences.