How Royals from Queen Elizabeth I to Prince Charles Kept Secrets in Their Jewels
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Just weeks before Prince Charles wed the late Princess Diana, he commissioned a gold bracelet for his lover Camilla Parker Bowles engraved with the initials of their pet names, Fred and Gladys. This way, Camilla could publicly flaunt this symbol of their secret affair without anyone ever knowing its true significance. Any faithful viewer of The Crown can tell you that their little secret didn't remain so for long—Diana discovered the bracelet just days before her wedding.
This infamous memento wasn't the first time a member of the royal family used jewels to convey a confidential message. From clandestine trysts to political allegiances, jewelry has historically been one of the best secret keepers.
The tradition goes way back: After the execution of King Charles I in 1649, his subjects covertly showed their loyalty by wearing miniature portraits of the monarch concealed in rings and pendants. At other times, jewels empowered royals: Queen Elizabeth I wore a ruby and diamond ring with hidden portraits of herself and her mother Anne Boleyn, whom her father had executed in 1536. The ring proved that the Queen’s love and loyalty to her mother was constant, and she wore the jewel until her death.
During Queen Victoria’s reign, the monarch commissioned deeply personal mourning jewels with portraits, words, even locks of hair, to remember her dearly departed (some of her pieces recently sold at Sotheby’s and far exceeded estimates).
Secret jewels are having a renaissance.
And you would be surprised how far some people will go to hold their passions and secrets close. Jeweler Temple St. Clair recently finished a bespoke gold locket that held the ashes of a client’s husband and was decorated with engravings that reflected their life together. “This was the story of someone who passed away too young, and my client created a tangible piece of jewelry that she could wear which represented something that is somewhat intangible,” the designer says.
The piece took several months to execute because it is illegal to mail human ashes. She had the locket made by her Florentine jewelers, and then had the ashes secured by goldsmiths in New York. The jewel is engraved with numerous icons, including the couple’s astrological signs, 13 stars (their lucky number), and a poem. “Jewelry is an intimate dialogue between the wearer and the piece. ” St. Clair says. “You wear pendants next to your heart, so it’s very personal.”
According to the designer, some of the earliest messages found in jewelry date back to the Hellenistic period, when intaglios were carved with profiles of goddesses, symbols, and words. “Intaglios and coins were often a window into the history and the beliefs of people during that period,” she says. These days, St. Clair’s signature pieces are also being customized for clients, including her Tree of Life and Angel pendants, which can be engraved on the back with family names, words, and dates. Her designs conceptually tell stories, some that only the wearer can know, like the working Sundial cuff and the Tolomeo pendant, which represents the 2,000-year-old astronomical theory that the earth was the center of the universe. In 2017, this piece became part of the permanent collection at Le Musée des Arts Décoratifs at the Louvre in Paris.
Lockets can hold personal stories and empowering messages.
“My lockets are the sexiest piece of jewelry a woman can own because they hold their secrets, and they only share them if they choose to,” says jewelry designer Monica Rich Kosann. A client who returned from safari in Africa recently commissioned her four-image locket with photos of animals, while another filled hers with images of her horses.
The designer’s own locket—one she rarely leaves home without—holds images of her dog, her two daughters, her late father, and the words Carpe Diem, and she often accompanies the piece with a charm bearing the symbol of Apollo, the god of music and healing, because she loves music. Kosann’s Locket Bar makes it easy to customize pieces with images, words, or a child’s artwork by taking photos directly from your iPhone and sizing them to fit into the locket.
Everyone is feeling a bit nostalgic these days, and the old-fashioned love letter is making a comeback.
Loquet London’s Lumiere pendant makes it possible to immortalize a love letter with a concealed miniature magnifying lens that reveals a hidden message. The words can be written in a loved one’s handwriting to make it even more meaningful, or you can select one of five illustrations by artist Charlie Mackesy.
Sometimes you just want to be reminded of home, which is why jeweler Solange Azagury Partridge designed miniature gold house rings with diamond windows and pink lacquered doors and flowers. The Home ring opens to reveal a ruby heart, while the Family ring features little gold people, each with a gemstone body, which can be made to reflect your own family, even your pets.
Remember those little charms from the Seventies? They just got more sophisticated.
It’s the year of charms. Just about everyone has a great memory of grandma’s charm bracelet, or perhaps your own from the '70s or '80s. Now, those charms are made in contemporary jewels with hooks that are easy to attach so you can mix and match them on bracelets or chunky gold link necklaces.
Last year, Annoushka Ducas created “My Life in Seven Charms,” which began with her own bracelet that included a tsavorite pea pod charm (to reflect her love of nature) with four freshwater pearls (to represent her children), a cable car with a ruby (signifying her family’s love of skiing), and a diamond paw print (for her love of dogs). The beauty of these bespoke jeweled charms is that they can be made into any symbol, whether laden with gems or in more simple gold styles.
Lindsey Julia Boyd is the latest entrepreneur to recognize the power of charms and jewelry to connect with people and places. She launched Rondel, an easy and interactive online shopping experience that offers charms of every variety that can clipped onto necklaces and bracelets. With so many options, you can create a jewel that tells your story. The eclectic array of charms include seashells, every imaginable animal, letters, and identifiers like Skier and Surfer. But if you can’t find what represents you, Boyd will make any custom charm or even consult with you to help you create a charm bracelet that can later become a family heirloom. After all, it was Boyd’s grandmother’s charm bracelet, which she redesigned into a stylish necklace, that inspired her to start this jewelry business in the first place.
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