Prince of Orange and Máxima Zorreguieta presented with winning jewellery design, Wednesday 9 January

Prince of Orange and Máxima Zorreguieta presented with winning jewellery design, Wednesday 9 January On Wednesday 9 January at Noordeinde Palace in The Hague, His Royal Highness the Prince of Orange and Miss Máxima Zorreguieta were presented with a piece of jewellery entitled Breakers and daybreak by Jos van den Elzen. Jos van den Elzen’s work won a special competition organised by the Dutch Federation of Gold and Silversmiths to design a wedding gift.

The Federation held the competition among its members in order to introduce the Dutch people to the many facets of gold and silversmithing, especially the design of jewellery and utensils. A panel of experts selected a shortlist of ten designs from the very large number of entries. Visitors to the competition website voted for the winning design.

Jos van den Elzen is a goldsmith living in Berlicum. He developed the idea for this piece in collaboration with Thea van Vliet. It is designed to be worn on the head and is made up of two parts. The first is a curved upright band, sanded to an ice matt finish and gilded a warm yellow. There is a cut garnet ‘clasp’ on the right-hand side, while unpolished garnet crystals and tiny diamonds create a red-tinged trail of clouds on the horizon. The second component is a net of small white gold tubes, with fine pearls at the nodes, attached to the band on the left and hanging loose on the right to create the effect of moving waves.

The Federation explains that the colours of the pearls are arranged to symbolise the symbiosis between two components: on the right they emit a reddish glow, giving way to a soft pink and then surf-white as they meet the garnets.

4 January 2002