In Cocoerow Efficient Jewelry’s “Kokoro” piece, an ant takes the kind of a pendant in 18-karat yellow gold, its head and physique set with 0.14 carats of emeralds and a 2.60-carat opal.
The pendant’s bail encompasses a 0.16-carat tourmaline, 0.14-carat sapphire, 0.08-carat aquamarine, 0.09-carat tanzanite, and 0.05-carat lab-grown diamond, all princess reduce.
Cocoerow Efficient Jewelry founder and designer Christine Olowonira talked about she was impressed by the impression of female ant-led colonies and their impression on our world.
“Of their ecosystems, predominantly female ant colonies are necessary, aerating the soil to strengthen fertility, dispersing seeds to promote plant growth, and sustaining ecological steadiness,” Olowonira talked about.
“Their collective efforts preserve the pure world and showcase the transformative vitality of collaboration and the necessary place of women-led applications in shaping thriving environments.”
The determine of the piece, “Kokoro,” is a Yoruba phrase that interprets to “ant.”
The “Kokoro” pendant was designed by Christine Olowonira, founder and designer of Cocoerow Efficient Jewelry, and manufactured by Patricio Alvarez in New York Metropolis. It makes use of mercury-free 18-karat yellow gold mined by Lucila Huanca in Peru, gems from Columbia Gem Dwelling, and a lab-grown diamond from Chatham.
The pendant was crafted in partnership with Reciprocity Jewels for its exhibition all through New York Metropolis Jewelry Week last month.
As one in all many better than 20 unbiased jewelry producers working with Reciprocity Jewels, Olowonira teamed with artisanal miners from Peru’s Madre de Dios space to craft her Kokoro piece with mercury-free gold that is traceable to the one who mined the gold.
Lucila Huanca mined the gold utilized in “Kokoro” whereas Patricio Alverez manufactured the piece in New York Metropolis.
The colored gems received right here from Columbia Gem Dwelling and the lab-grown diamond from Chatham.
Reciprocity Jewels is a grouping of designers who intention to reshape the jewelry present chain by emphasizing the price of accountability and transparently sourced provides, notably Peruvian gold.
For this 12 months’s exhibition at NYCJW, the group labored with gold from Asociación Minera Tauro Fátim, a neighborhood of miners in a distant mining corridor throughout the Amazon.
The collective of miners obtained teaching in mercury-free mining and reforestation strategies from Pure Earth to realize Fairmined certification.
“I chosen the ‘Kokoro’ pendant for our Reciprocity exhibition because of it fantastically embodies the spirit of the collaboration,” Olowonira talked about.
“Impressed by the ant, the central motif of my assortment titled ‘Kokoro’ (Yoruba for ‘ant’), this piece celebrates the magnificence of unity, the harmony of nature, and the facility present in collective effort.”
The Kokoro pendant retails for $3,908 and is obtainable on the Cocoerow Efficient Jewelry site.