There are certain stones I never seem to tire of, and sapphires are one of them.

I think a lot of that comes down to colour. There is so much variation in sapphires that even two stones from the same colour family can have completely different personalities when you place them next to each other. It is that individuality, and never quite knowing what shade I might come across next, that keeps them endlessly interesting to me.

No two ever feel quite the same

One might be a soft, almost misty green. Another might sit somewhere between blue and teal. Some are deep and saturated, while others have a much quieter colour that only really reveals itself when the light changes.

That unpredictability is probably what keeps me interested.

I never feel as though I’m looking for the same sapphire twice.

When I source stones, I’m usually drawn to the ones that make me stop for a second. Sometimes it is the colour. Sometimes it is an unusual proportion or the way the stone holds light. And occasionally there is no particularly sensible explanation for it at all. You simply keep coming back to one.

Those are often the stones I end up wanting to design around.

Letting the stone lead

With sapphire rings, I prefer to let the stone lead. A softer colour might need a very simple setting. A deeper stone can completely change once it is placed beside bright diamonds. Yellow gold can bring warmth into a green sapphire, while a cooler setting can make blue tones feel even more pronounced.

It is one of my favourite parts of designing jewellery: seeing how one small decision changes the entire character of a ring.

And I think this is also why sapphires work so beautifully for engagement rings.

There is so much room for individuality without having to create something complicated. An oval sapphire in a classic trilogy setting can still feel completely different from every other trilogy ring simply because that particular colour exists only in that stone.

The new collection

The same is true of the sapphires I’ve chosen for the new SPJ collection.

They are different from one another, which was important to me. I didn’t want a row of stones that all felt like variations of the same idea. I wanted different shades, different moods and different reasons for being drawn to each one.

Some are softer. Some have much more depth. Some feel immediately classic, while others are a little less expected.

That is probably the simplest answer to why I keep coming back to sapphires.

There is always another colour to discover.

The new sapphire collection launches this Sunday at 6pm.