Due to the special nature of these jewels, they are only available for purchase one per person. 

IMPORTANT: This listing is for a One of a Kind jewel that cannot be replaced. We recommend Express Shipping with signature required upon delivery to make sure it arrives safely into your hands. 

This necklace is Ready To Ship and will leave the studio in 3 - 5 business days. 

Please note : This ring is a size 6. As this is a one of a kind ring and the gemstone is irreplaceable, we are unable to resize it.

Pulled from the Vault, one of my earliest designs returns: a life cast crow claw cradles a ghostly pale rose quartz sphere.

Based on the image of the 'Ball and Claw' used throughout Victorian era furniture design, this is a reimagined take on our beloved 'The Messenger' necklace. The design's roots historically come from ancient China: in myth, the Emperor's Dragon guarded a pearl or a crystal ball that was considered to be a symbol of wisdom and purity. I've always had a fascination with crows. Born near the sea, I often enjoyed the presence of these birds; their dark, inky coloring, their ominous cawing heralding messages from the unseen, their seemingly otherworldliness; all of it was threaded through my childhood and early life. They are personal symbols of protection and comfort for me, and the highly tactile nature of both the textured claw and the smooth sphere help to ground me when I hold it in my palm or run my fingers over it. 

The Crow, akin to the Vulture, are opportunistic in their eating habits as they'll even eat from the dead. Partly because of this, they have been linked to the Underworld as liminal, supernatural creatures, co-existing between the realm of the natural, living world, and the realms of the unseen and of the dead; ferrying messages to and fro these earthly and spiritual planes. Considered tricksters in some cultures, they have also been proven to have a strong sense of memory, their remembrances extending as far as individual human faces that have wronged them as well as to those who have fed them, as they are known to leave gifts to their caretakers. This gift giving proves that we can be in relation to wild creatures without bringing them inside our homes.

Associated with folklore as prophets with the ability to foresee the future, their presence and caws were known to be used in auguries / divination rituals. Lastly, within Alchemy, the image of the Crow is symbolized as the first stage of the transformative process  'Nigredo'. This stage involved the blackening or cooking of the alchemical ingredients to begin the pathway to the final stage, attaining the Philosopher's Stone. Within Carl Jung's interpretation of Alchemy as "Inner Alchemy", this first stage causes the individual to confront their Shadow Self, the start of a journey of wholeness by bringing the unconscious into the awareness of the conscious self. 

*Details* :

- 45 mm from top to bottom

- 31 mm wide

- Solid Sterling Silver  

- This ring has been hand oxidized to achieve our favorite shade of stormy gray and burnished to reveal the bright luminous silver beneath

- Set with one 16 mm Rose Quartz Sphere

Rose Quartz:

Rose Quartz is known the world over for its beautiful pink coloring, is at least 35 million years old, with records dating back to 600 B.C.. During that time, it was given amongst lovers, family and friends as love tokens. It was also used in beauty rituals as far back as Ancient Egypt where evidence of it as facial masks has been found in tombs amongst grave goods. Metaphysically, it is best known as the master 'love stone', used in love spells, helpful in matters of self-confidence, anger, disappointment, and seemingly always mentioned in tandem with "healing" - a word so dense with promise it makes me both hopeful and strangely put off. I feel a bit lonely in my discomfort; I've never been one to only seek beauty in its traditional forms and it seems like Rose Quartz is the fairest of them all -the glittering prom queen who about to have a bucket of blood poured on her.

My favorite lore around this stone concerns the Goddesses Isis and Aphrodite / Venus, which are all connected by similar attributes and were conjoined when the Romans annexed Egypt. The Egyptian Goddess Isis, one of the most revered deities over time, is believed to have used Rose Quartz "maintain her eternal youth and divine beauty" and therefore influenced the beauty culture ( see above ) in ancient times. Aphrodite is the Greek iteration of Venus, with whom she is often syncretized - sharing many overlapping traits: such as her beauty, passion and pleasure, love, and fertility. Each Goddess was considered to be a standard of ideal beauty and representative of love, yet also each was associated with the enemy of love - death. Isis, in a gruesome yet romantic gesture, collected the disembodied pieces of her murdered brother/husband Osiris, and resurrected him - becoming impregnated with Horus simultaneously. This myth was revered in Ancient Egypt, fertility rituals around Osiris' resurrection abounded

For the Greeks, one of the most popular myths centering Aphrodite is also a genesis tale for Rose Quartz in and of itself : Aphrodite fell in love with the beautiful mortal Adonis who was killed by a wild boar ( perhaps a jealous Ares in disguise, or sent by Artemis as punishment ). As he lay dying in the forest, Aphrodite came to his side, herself also bleeding after becoming tangled and wounded in a bramble bush. Their co-mingled blood is thought to have fallen on Quartz, ever after giving Rose Quartz is pink hue. Adonis, like Osiris, was also resurrected in some tellings and his tale was also associated with grieving rituals in connection to the natural cycles of life.

Personally, I've struggled both with writing about Rose Quartz as well as pairing it with my jewelry. It's a stone that has long been deeply connected with the romantic aspects of love, healing, forgiveness, beauty and well-being - but for me, I've shied away or have had discomfort with each of these notions and descriptors. Each of them has also been, for me, tangled up with grief and death - shadow feelings. However, while I think Rose Quartz often lacks its shadow in popular descriptions of it - I think it's powerful for these exact reasons. As much as it is beautiful, it is often turned to as a balm during our worst moments - the ugly and horrific times of heart brokenness; representing our hearts in all their nuance - capable of the beauty of love but also the madness of loss. In this way, it illustrates the tensions between beauty and horror I unconsciously & consciously seek in everything. It is a phoenix, burning down like the Tower into ashes but also comforts us while we rise from the rubble. It is a fierce shield that guards us, but it is also has a soothing gentleness. In this way each Rose Quartz jewel carries a dual aspect of 'psychic armor' both the energies and medicines of the snakes and bats that form the gloomy silver settings of the jewels, and Rose Quartz, a beautiful balm that assists us during our darkness moments, a reminder of the sweet-bitterness of being alive on this timeline.’

This jewel is hand cut and therefore may have small signs of the carver's hands along the edges. This has not been fabricated by a machine, it has been made by hand and therefore isn't uniformly perfect. The photographs accurately portray the quality of the stone. 

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