The jewel, which is so well adapted to a woman’s adornment, is a combination of the riches of nature and art; it is concentrated brilliancy, the quintessence of light…. In the bowels of the earth, in the deserted channels of exhausted torrents, in the gloomy depths of the mineral world, stars are concealed that rival in their beauty those of the firmament. The fresh spendours of dawn, the sun’s incandescent rays, the magnificent sunsets, the brilliant colours of the rainbow, all are found enclosed in a morsel of pure carbon or in the centre of a stone…. uniting as though urged by the secret instinct of the beautiful, to compose prismatic forms of astonishing regularity… ~Charles Blanc, Art in Ornament and Dress, 1875
Jewelry is like the perfect spice – it always complements what’s already there.