Jewelry

True Blue: September's Birthstone's Popularity From Ancient Times to Modern Jewelry - Forbes

Multi-colored sapphires have become the popular stone to create a rainbow or ombre effect in jewelry over the past few years. It seems like a trend that continues to evolve but designers are also in a blue mood and  there is no gem in this color like September’s birthstone— blue sapphire—that says elegant, regal, modern and classic all at the same time. And this year is no exception. Blue sapphires in pale to vivid royal hues are winning the hearts (and necks, wrists, earlobes and fingers) of a who new generation of women as well as those who have witnessed first-hand the ups and downs, ins and outs and shining and defining moments in sapphires, from say the last 20 years of the 20th century to current times.

But there is no way to talk about sapphires without providing a brief overview of their history and symbolism. Medieval kings wore the gem around their necks as a defense from harm, By the 11th century, sapphires were chosen for ecclesiastical rings. In Roman times it was believed if someone were untruthful, the sapphire’s color would change.

It has been reported that the first betrothal rings were given by royal families in the 14th and 15th centuries. Sapphires were favored over other gems, many passed down through generations of nobility. This all made perfect sense: Sapphires symbolize romantic love, truth, fidelity and loyalty.

It’s no wonder that sapphire had remained a popular choice throughout history for engagement rings as well as other jewels.

If we fast-forward to 1981, Lady Diana Spencer is credited with bringing back the sapphire engagement ring when Prince Charles proposed. Jewelers around the world wasted no time in turning out similar style rings almost immediately after 19-year-old Diana chose the vivid blue stone set in an antique style with a halo of diamonds from a selection shown by Garrard of Mayfair, crown jeweler at the time. A global trend was born for women who wanted an engagement ring fit for a modern-day princess. Diana continued to wear it even after her divorce from Prince Charles. In 1997, after Diana’s tragic death, her sons were allowed to select mementos from her jewelry collection. Twelve-year-old Harry picked out the sapphire ring, and William chose his mother’s yellow gold Cartier watch. When William announced his intention to wed Kate Middleton, the brothers swapped mementos. Asked in a television interview about his marriage proposal, William told the journalist that he had been carrying the ring around for weeks and “literally would not let it go”: “It’s my mother’s engagement ring so I thought it was quite nice… she’s not going to be around to share in any of the fun and excitement of it all—this was my way of keeping her close to it all… it’s a sapphire with some diamonds…I am sure everyone recognizes it from previous times.”

As Kate Middleton lifted her hand to show the ring to the cameras, a media blitz was created around the world; jewelry store phones began to ring off the hook and designers started designing the next wave of sapphire rings.

But it was in the 1930s and ’40s that sapphires had first regained popularity for engagement rings and other jewelry, worn by some of Hollywood’s most glamorous leading ladies. It was also during this period that Cabochon-cut and star sapphires surged in popularity as movie-goers admired the stone’s beauty on film, as worn by icons of the day.

Mary Pickford, known to audiences as “America’s Sweetheart” for her acting roles and her eye and a desire for important jewels. Douglas Fairbanks to whom she was engaged and then married acquired the most exceptional of all star sapphires for her, The Star of Bombay, which the well-known jeweler of the time, Trabert & Hoeffer (which later became Trabert & Hoeffer-Mauboussin) had set into a platinum ring. The stone features a six-point star. The three crossed lines of the star sapphire represent faith, hope and destiny, sometimes associated with three angels who offer protection to those who wear the stone. Pickford bequeathed the Star of Bombay, which she had owned for almost 60 years, to the Smithsonian, where it resides today. 

Another actress who preferred sapphires among other gems was Joan Crawford . She was renowned for her love of the gemstone and was dubbed “Joan Blue” by the press. After Crawford’s first marriage to Douglas Fairbanks Jr.—whose father had lavished Mary Pickford with some of the finest sapphires in the world—ended in divorce, she became engaged to actor and frequent co-star Franchot Tone. Raymond Yard, a famous jeweler of the time created an engagement ring featuring a 70-carat star sapphire. She already owned a 72-carat emerald-cut sapphire ring, and would often wear them together. The most publicized of all of Crawford’s pieces were designed by Yard–a bracelet with three-star sapphires of 73.15 carats, 63.61 carats and 57.65 carats in a wide platinum Art Deco bracelet, featuring fine piercing work with baguette, half-moon and marquise-shaped diamonds.

All of actor William Powell’s leading ladies, both on and off-screen, wore star sapphires, and they were all true blue in their choice of jewelry. Powell bought his second wife, actress Carole Lombard, a star sapphire ring when they married in 1931. Another woman in Powell’s life was co-star Myrna Loy, who acted with him in 14 films, including  Thin Man series. Loy also owned an important star sapphire, set into a platinum leaf mounting with baguette diamonds on the shank. According to the ring’s most recent owner, Hollywood jeweler to the stars and collector, Neil Lane, Myrna Loy wore the sapphire in the Thin Man publicity shots. Lane notes that this particular Art Deco ring is truly reflective of the Golden Age of Hollywood. It is thought the ring was created by Paul Flato.

 William Powell was also attached to Jean Harlow, an avid collector of sapphires. There was a story doing the rounds in Hollywood that when leading man William Powell first proposed to Harlow in 1936, he offered her a beautiful, but traditional, diamond ring; Harlow accepted the proposal but refused the ring. The platinum-blonde bombshell supposedly felt a large star sapphire would better suit her personal style. Powell purchased a large sapphire. She wore it on the set of Libeled Lady and her final film, Saratoga in 1937 when she was taken seriously ill and died with Powell at her side.

The Duchess of Windsor played a part in the renewed popularity of sapphires in the 1950s when she was seen wearing a Cartier three-dimensional panther clip brooch, featuring a 152.35-carat Kashmir cabochon sapphire, designed in 1949. The Duchess was partial to sapphires in a variety of pieces: she, like many wearers, believed the gem brought out the color of her eyes. This classic Cartier sapphire is set in white gold and platinum with single-cut white diamonds. It has yellow pear-shaped diamond eyes with smaller sapphire cabochons for the feline’s spots. It was designed under the tutelage of Cartier’s creative director Jeanne Toussaint, whom he nicknamed ‘the Panther’. Toussaint created many different versions of the powerful cat. Her prowess and instincts about jewelry and what women wanted were instrumental in the panther becoming synonymous with projecting an aura of confidence and fearlessness.

Today’s sapphire jewelry runs the gamut from geometric and ultra-sleek, to antique and vintage-inspired, to more radical designs that have a rock and roll edge to glamorous pieces that hark back to Hollywoods' heyday and the legends who made sapphires famous. 

If you are a September baby, you have a wide range of looks from which to choose or if you are a woman like Joan Crawford who has deemed sapphire her favorite stone, then you too will be able to select the vivid and powerful gem in styles that fit and compliment your lifestyle.