The Hatton Garden Podcast

Tessa Metcalfe

Tessa is an unorthodox presence in Hatton Garden but nonetheless part of the place.  I had a great time chatting with her in her shop at the end of the street about all sorts of things, from pigeons to window cleaners, from her creative process to the politics of diamonds.  Enjoy!
 
How Tessa got into jewellery.
Why Pigeons?
Where Tessa draws inspiration from.
Jewellery and art.
Diamonds.
Gemstones.
Tessa’s creative process.
Symbolism and the everyday.
Heart shaped gemstones.
Creative tone of voice.
Coming to Hatton Garden as a female maker.
Questions from Instagram.
The future of jewellery?

Gareth Harris

**Apologies, but the sound quality is poor in this episode** with some of the recording unusable so the editing is a bit of a dog's breakfast. The substance of what Gareth had to say was so valuable that I hope you will condone the decision to run with it.
For this episode I visited Gareth of Smith and Harris is his dungeon workshop on Hatton Garden.  Surrounded by the tools of the trade, some of which he and his business partner Dennis have made or had made themselves, we covered a lot of ground, from mudlarking to bungling Kate Moss into the back of a Land Rover in broad daylight.
We covered:
 
The tools in Gareth’s workshop.
Memories of being an apprentice.
How Hatton Garden has changed.
Advice for becoming a jeweller.
Why Gareth is a jeweller and not a farmer.
Gareth’s favourite aspects of Hatton Garden.
How people find meaning in jewellery.
Some of the commissions Gareth has delivered.
Trophies.
Making an 18ct Gold life size statue of Kate Moss.
The benefits of welding over soldering.
More on Kate Moss.
The anonymity of workshops in Hatton Garden.
From the workshop to the velvet cushion.
Mudlarking on the banks of the Thames.
The ecosystem of Hatton Garden.
Gareth’s predictions for the future.

Norman Belgherbi-Martus

When I first stepped into the offices of Ino Creative, Norman's company, I had a sense that this was the future, or at least one aspect of it, for the bespoke jewellery industry in Hatton Garden.  Norman's perspectives and insights in this conversation are valuable and informative - well worth a listen.  Thanks for giving me your time, brother!
We covered:
Valentine's Day.
The challenges of casting.
Secrecy and transparency in jewellery manufacture.
How Norman got into the trade.
Starting Ino Creative.
Being a CAD designer in Hatton Garden.
CAD designed vs handmade jewellery.
The ecosystem of Hatton Garden.
Advice for a young person getting into the jewellery profession.
3D metal printing.
Natural and Lab grown diamonds.
How the advent of lab diamonds has effected the trade.
Norman's predictions for the future.
 
 
 

Stuart Poole

I sit down with Stuart Poole to discuss his work in founding Nineteen48 Gems and the challenges of supplying fully traceable, ethical gemstones.  Here's what we covered:
 
How Stuart got into the world of jewellery and started 1984 gems.
The importance of reputation and relationships.
Establishing a traceable supply chain.
The Sri Lankan mining industry.
Artisanal and large scale mining.
Description of a mine in Sri Lanka.
Setting up the company.
Working in the Sri Lankan market.
The challenge of tracing individual gemstones through the supply chain.
Gemstone holograms and QR codes.
The effect of laboratory diamonds.
Comparison of Diamond and Gemstone mining.
Moyo Gemstones collaboration in Tanzania.
Comparison of working in Tanzania and Sri Lankan.
Current trends.
Mining in developed economies vs developing.
Sapphires.
Native light and how that might affect gemstone desirability.
Stuart's predictions.

Marcus McCallum

I talk with Marcus McCallum, eminent gemstone supplier to the jewellery trade in Hatton Garden.  I'm grateful to him for being a good sport and trusting me with this first instalment of the podcast.  The insights he had to offer were broad and deep. 
 
Introduction: the aim of The Hatton Garden Podcast.
How Marcus came to Hatton Garden.
How Hatton Garden has changed over the last 40 years.
The ecosystem of Hatton Garden.
Rising rents and the pandemic.
Marcus’s collaboration with Faberge and the V&A museum.
Hatton Garden and the West End.
Hatton Garden and the UK.
Ethics and sustainability in the gemstone trade.
The importance of long term, local relationships.
Small scale and large scale mining.
Gemstone and diamond mining.
Current trends.
Marcus’s predictions for the future.