Posted by: hurray November 5, 2014
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Hey Riddle,
I am not an artisan jeweler but a jeweler dealer. I try to find the best artisans for big jewellery names, primarily based in Europe. There are excellent jewlers in Nepal, but very few that you can really trust. For example, if you want a gold ring that weighs 6 grams, the artisan asks 8 grams from you. Fair enough as he needs more gold since some will be lost during the process or will be transferred into dust during cutting and polishing process. But the artisans will refuse to give you back the gold dust or the wastage. He will keep it for himself. Ok, now in nepal the labor is not expensive so the artisan needs that extra gold to make up for this low wage. But even if you offer him a higher wage he will still keep the wasted gold. And most of them will not engage in making simple, solid design gold jewels. They want to make intricate designs. Have you even wondered why gold jewels in Nepal are so much more detailed with lots of joins compared to the western jewelry designs? Well, the trick is, the more detailed a jewelery piece is, the more joins you will need on that piece. And gold is joined or soldered by a different metal which costs peanuts. So now you go and buy your gold jewels from a store in Nepal, you will pay according to it's weight + the labor cost. But the thing is, the solder or the metal used to join parts of the jewel weighs in also. Hence you pay the price of gold for the metal used to solder gold. This is where the gold sellers make their money.
The other part is selling you 21 carat gold jewelry while it is only 20 carat, or in some cases 19 carats. That's a completely different story. You don't want to go there.
I am not an artisan jeweler but a jeweler dealer. I try to find the best artisans for big jewellery names, primarily based in Europe. There are excellent jewlers in Nepal, but very few that you can really trust. For example, if you want a gold ring that weighs 6 grams, the artisan asks 8 grams from you. Fair enough as he needs more gold since some will be lost during the process or will be transferred into dust during cutting and polishing process. But the artisans will refuse to give you back the gold dust or the wastage. He will keep it for himself. Ok, now in nepal the labor is not expensive so the artisan needs that extra gold to make up for this low wage. But even if you offer him a higher wage he will still keep the wasted gold. And most of them will not engage in making simple, solid design gold jewels. They want to make intricate designs. Have you even wondered why gold jewels in Nepal are so much more detailed with lots of joins compared to the western jewelry designs? Well, the trick is, the more detailed a jewelery piece is, the more joins you will need on that piece. And gold is joined or soldered by a different metal which costs peanuts. So now you go and buy your gold jewels from a store in Nepal, you will pay according to it's weight + the labor cost. But the thing is, the solder or the metal used to join parts of the jewel weighs in also. Hence you pay the price of gold for the metal used to solder gold. This is where the gold sellers make their money.
The other part is selling you 21 carat gold jewelry while it is only 20 carat, or in some cases 19 carats. That's a completely different story. You don't want to go there.