By Ameera Steward
For The Birmingham Times
Avani Rupa Fine Jewelers, a showroom at 2408 Canterbury Road, Birmingham, Ala. has three featured collections: the signature/heritage, the classic and the bridal.
The pieces that speak to owners Avani and Rupa Patel creatively are part of their signature/heritage collection. “And we have a lot of those because a lot of our clients love how we already design and they don’t want to change it,” Avani said. “Our heritage collection has a lot to do with, what the collection says, heritage.”
Avani said that they use Indian-style influence in their heritage collection. For instance, Jhumka [joom-ka] earrings, meaning bell earrings; layered necklaces; lots of gemstones; lots of color; dangles and hanging pearls.
“It’s just…very unique,” Avani said. “It’s for a different type of person…people that want something…that not everybody else is wearing.” The signature collection is also one of a kind, where she and her mom source “cool and different gemstones, slices of stones, things that people have really never seen or even know [of],” she added.
“That’s a lot of our pieces that are in the heritage and the signature [collection]…We only make one of them…and if anybody ever comes back and wants to recreate that design, we try to recreate it in a way that’s different so that no two people are wearing the same piece,” Avani said.
The Classic Collection consists of timeless pieces.
“Classic means you’re going to wear it now or 50 years from now, or they wore it 30 years ago,” Avani explained. “It’s more like the hoops, and the tennis bracelets and…solitaires [single diamond jewelry] or earrings – things that…you see other people wear.”
The Bridal Collection consists of engagement rings and wedding bands.
They offer cases filled with rings they’ve made which are ready to buy and take home, but there’s also a custom side to their bridal designs.
“[Customers] give me an idea of what they like [and] what they don’t [and] I bring in the diamonds for them to see … we only deal with diamonds from the Gemology Institute of America (GIA),” said Avani, who has a gemologist degree from the GIA.
“The client could have an engagement ring in two to three weeks, and sometimes it can take eight to 10 weeks, depending on the complexity of the design, the customer’s timeline, or what they’re looking for.”
The business also offers custom designed pieces that can either be created from scratch or from an heirloom.
“Custom jewelry is supposed to be representative of the person’s personality, and I’m a really big believer of that,” said Avani. “So I want to get to know that person, I want to get what the meaning behind the piece is, why we’re creating the piece – the story.”
Once she gets the story she can understand the piece she is creating, Avani said.
During the first meeting with the customer, she gets a lot of ideas, writes everything down, and understands their preferences. A couple of weeks later she follows up with sketches, ideas she’s had, and the direction she thinks they should go.
“We’re willing to design pieces that maybe are out of the box, that are different, that are a little risky to design – that most people wouldn’t,” Avani said. “But we do it and it’s a big payoff in the end because people see how different, and how intricate, and how unique we are as people and designers.”
She continued, “We think fine jewelry should be classic forever and it should be something you cherish in the past, right now and in the future…The pieces that you buy from us [now] become heirloom pieces for the future.”
For more, email info@avanirupa.com.
