Feted worldwide as the man who put the rock into rocks, Stephen Webster took time out of his busy schedule to rock up for an interview with the Bench to talk about how he started in the business and built the global A-lister’s favourite luxury jewellery brand.


How did you get to become a jewellery designer? It must have been an unconventional journey. It was! At school I was good at art and went to Medway College of Design at 16 to study fashion design. I could certainly draw, but when I got there I stumbled upon the jewellery course instead. I was obsessed with making things and the craftsmanship involved in making jewellery really fi red me up.


From there I went to work for John Donald, one of Britain’s most respected jewellery designers at that time, who allowed me the creative freedom to put my own stamp on things. After a couple of years I decided to go it alone. But I could create pretty much anything apart from customers! So I ended up doing diamond setting, working 10 hours a day for a paltry £8!


About 6 years after leaving college, I met this Canadian gemmologist who was off ering £30,000 a year for a ‘complete jewellery all-rounder’. I didn’t really know what the job was going to be like but I decided to take it anyway. He arranged to fl y me over to Canada


About Stephen Webster.


Rock God. Stephen Webster, founder and Creative Director of Stephen Webster Ltd and a Creative Director of the world’s oldest jewellery house Garrard since 2008, is the enfant terrible of the British jewellery making scene.


which was an experience because I’d never been on a plane before. This was the guy who introduced me to gemstones. He was an adventurer whose passion lay in collecting


gemstones in places like Brazil, Africa and Pakistan. He’d come back with great gems I’d never heard of but he needed someone who could work with them. And these gems were big and I mean big! So you really couldn’t put them into small jewellery items. They had to be big; they fi red my imagination and defi ned my style. I loved them.


These gems were big and I mean big! So you really couldn’t put them into small jewellery items. They had to be big; they fi red my imagination and defi ned my style.


After a few years I came back to London for a short while but then moved to Santa Barbara, California to become the


Webster’s glam-rock forms might appear to be spontaneous explosions of creativity but behind every apparently off -the-cuff gesture lies a keen eye for detail, a passion for his materials, an exquisite eye and a lifetime’s dedication to the jewellery maker’s craft.


The Stephen Webster brand is available at over 200 outlets worldwide and seven dedicated Stephen Webster boutiques in London, Beverly Hills, Moscow, St. Petersburg, Kiev, Vienna and Marbella.


head designer for a custom jewellery fi rm, where I won design awards and began to build a reputation as an innovative and original jeweller. All the old Hollywood crowd lived there which helped!


Sounds like all highs. Any lows? Well, while I was working in Canada really. I loved the work but homesickness got the better of me and in 1990 I moved into a tiny fl at in London and started again from scratch as a complete unknown!


London calling then! Yes, but when I fi rst came back from the States in the late 80’s, there was no


Webster’s dedicated fan base naturally rocks too with devotees including Sir Elton John, Madonna, Christina Aguilera, Kate Moss, Mickey Rourke and Kate Beckinsale.


While his awards glitter almost as brightly as his fabulous creations with accolades including winning the ‘British Luxury Jeweller of the Year Award’ three times, ‘Diamond Jeweller of the Year’, ‘Jewellery Designer of the Year’ and ‘UK Jewellery Brand of the Year’.


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