The joy of gems

On a special sourcing trip to India, Lucia Silvestri, the creative director of jewellery at Bulgari, talks technological innovations, 75 years of the Serpenti, and why Jaipur is the seat of all her inspirations.

- AKANKSHA KAMATH

Lucia Silvestri, 65, is a woman who knows her mind. She has just wrapped up a sourcing trip to Rajasthan and her eyes gleam with the glow of the uncut emeralds and rubies that she is on the brink of acquiring. "When I see a stone I like, I never say, My God, so beautiful.' It takes months of negotiations that continue long after I have left the city until I finally have what I want."

Silvestri shares a special relationship with gemstones. She feels their energy. "In Jaipur, there is a special energy because of the gems. You can feel it everywhere," she explains, gesticulating with her hands, each stacked with Serpenti bracelets. The colours add to her positive mood, she explains. "I can talk to the gemstones. I have a relationship with them. I look at them and I say, 'Buongiorno, how are you?' every morning."

At Bulgari, she is both the chief gems buyershopping for the house's spectacular stones and the jewellery creative director overseeing the process of turning said gems into stunning pieces. In 2019, she celebrated 40 years of working with the Roman jewellery house. She was hired as a secretary at the brand (when it was just five stores strong) and a business lesson she learned from the Bulgari brothers-"Don't buy a gemstone until you know how you are going to use it"-continues to hold her in good stead. Today, she emulates that via the 93-carat cabochon-cut Jaipur emerald that sits delicately in the mouth of the Serpenti snake in the form of a lucid green egg.