Today, I am contemplating colors and blooms and heat and all sparkly things that persist. I was reminded by a beautiful friend the other day about floriography, the language of flowers. I thought about how much can be said without words and if this is something we are losing.
It's one of my favorite traits of the feminine: being able to connect so much meaning and impart emotion by opening up to the natural world around us. Victorians especially loved their secret language of flowers, using them to send messages of love, hatred, disdain, and lust.
The iris is associated with a Greek messenger god who would send notes through rainbows to Zeus and Hera. Iris was trusted, loyal, and heralded as a beautiful communicator. The color purple, seen as a carved amethyst, belied wisdom and high esteem of the wearer. The purple iris was for someone of emotional safety, strength, and clarity.
With perfectly detailed jade leaves and a brilliant diamond center, this 18K gold and gemstone ring is one of my favorite floral rings I've ever come across.
There are endless reasons why I love antique jewelry. The uniqueness of something made by hand before mass production and marketing flooded our psyches, conditioning us to what we were "meant" to covet. But I think my favorite way to fall in love with these pieces is discovering how well they have been loved.
Consider this band of solid gold with edges softened with age. Can you imagine how much it was worn? How deeply it was trusted? I think about how these old European cut diamonds were admired, how someone felt pleasure in the familiar everyday sparkle of them.
I think about how the settings are further burnished, naturally to hold them safe. And I think about, above all, how someone else will notice these things in their own wearing of a piece like this.
How it will impact their memories or create space to pause.