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eration of the family to play a role in the business, Honour is determined to soak up as much of her uncle’s expertise as possible, while bringing her youthful outlook to the rarefied world of high jewellery. ‘I was fascinated by the gazelles’ spiralling horns and thought they would be really cool as earrings,’ she says – an idea realised by Boodles’ head of design, Rebecca Hawkins. Elegant corkscrew earrings are set with mandarin garnets and white diamonds or brown and white diamonds, their colours inverted in each mismatching pair. Inside, engraved gold recalls the texture of a gazelle’s horns. Textured gold appears throughout the collection to evoke animalistic patterns. Scaly Green Mamba snakes wind around black opals, while the Zambezi bangle fea- tures diamonds set in an armour-like pattern, its underside pierced with an openwork that recalls a crocodile’s rugged skin. ‘We try to use every surface to tell the story,
by setting stones on the underside or using different textures of gold, so that the narra- tive is represented from every angle,’ says Rebecca, who joined Boodles in 1990. Some pieces are figurative: an engraved rose-gold elephant dangles a 26-carat morganite from its trunk, and a flamboyance of flamingos take flight among morganites, sapphires and diamonds. Others are more abstract: yellow and brown marquise-cut diamonds evoke a lion’s mane ruffling in the wind, bezel-set orange and yellow diamonds echo a giraffe’s distinctive pattern, white diamonds are accented with black enamel, suggestive of a zebra’s markings. The vibrant, geometric Maasai Mara set
pays homage to the traditional textiles worn by the Maasai people, with whom Honour and Nicholas spent a memorable evening. ‘It was an unforgettable experience, having sundowners with some of the Maasai com- munity and learning what it takes to become a Maasai warrior,’ Honour says. ‘I don’t think
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the collection would be complete without celebrating their community.’ The whole range, she adds, is a way to
‘give back to a continent that has given us so much’. Since 2021, Boodles’ gold jewellery has been craſted from traceable single mine origin (SMO) gold. All the gold used in the Around Africa in 8 Days collection origi- nates from the responsibly run Sabodala- Massawa mine in Senegal, which is known for its biodiversity initiatives. While they were in Kenya, Honour and Nicholas visited St John Nguluni Primary School, whose ac- cess to safe drinking water was enabled by Just a Drop, Boodles’ charity of the year. The jeweller’s donations have also helped to fund a sand dam, providing the local com- munity with a means to cultivate drought-re- sistant agriculture. All of which can be a selling point, which is occasionally amplified by Boodles’ clients own personal links to the continent. ‘There are few things that can tell a story
like jewellery, and our clients are always drawn to places that hold special memories,’ says Honour. ‘One of our clients found out about the Maasai Mara suite, which was where she spent her last holiday with her late husband, so there’s immediately an emo- tional connection. These pieces are made to become part of the wearer’s own story.’
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