Beautiful! And it will look WONDERFUL with your earrings! The color-matching is amazing! Congrats to you on taking the leap to go with Leon...it certainly paid off!
Thanks everyone for your nice comments. This spinel ring is now my favorite among my color stone ring collection. I will be getting a lot of wear out of it. This color has been popular since last winter, so I have already have clothes to go with the set.
Beacon: I had fun taking the additional pictures. Wish I know more than just point and shoot.
Dianabanana: I am sure your sapphire ring will be stunning when you finally get it. You have been waiting a long time.
Harriet: Thanks for the info about Van Clef and Arpel reviving the ''butterfly'' I am famiilar with their dragon fly, which has been copied a lot, but I have not seen their butterfly until I browsed their web site just now. Wonder if Leon got ''inspired'' by the Van Clef butterfly. I like butterflies but I don''t think I will be buying more as I already have two butterfly pins, a plique-q-jour enamel one with a pink sapphire body and a jade one with a body made out of natural pearls. In my mother''s generation, all the ladies had a jade butterfly pin. Were these popular in Singapore too? Here is a picture of my plique butterfly I think it goes nicely with my spinel set.
Let me ask my mum. Have you seen the butterfly brooch at the Smithsonian? It''s micropaved with Montana corundum melee.As for yours, I love love love plique a jour. I once asked Leon to make something in plique a jour and he asked if I wanted to blow up his workshop!
Oh my god, what an awesome pin! I hope you don''t mind my combining a couple of your pictures. It looks to me like that butterfly is ready to settle down on the leaf next to the new ring. What awesome pieces that you have, and they will be beyond stunning together.
Fly Girl: What an interesting observation. It never occurred to me that the colors of the butterfly match the Daum dish. I can''t resist another picture. The butterfly just landed on the dish to take a peek at the ring.
Harriet: I have not seen the brooch at the Smithsonian. I love Art Nouveau plique-a-jour pins and I have collected a few over the years, original and repro. This butterfly is a reproduction. I bought it from a East Coast antique dealer who bought it from another antique dealer in NY. It was made by a young artist/jeweler in Istanbul. I think the process for making plique enamel is hazardous to your health and not permitted in the US. A couple of years ago, I saw similar brooches at the antique show in Las Vegas.