Which comes first: the stone or the design?

Which comes first: the stone or the design?

For brands such as Bvlgari, Boucheron, Cartier and Van Cleef & Arpels, the answer can come from emotion, heritage, architecture and the character of a single jewel The assumption seems reasonable enough: that a great jewel begins with a great stone. That somewhere in the mines, once the right gem was found, everything followed. The reality, as told by the people who make these things, is considerably more complex. Cartier treats the stone as a m…