As an emerging icon in the Biennale des Antiquaires in Paris last year, Diana Zhang was the only Chinese female jewellery designer who participated in such prestigious exhibition. The collection “One year in China”, with themes of Spring, Summer, Autumn and Winter, has yielded brilliant responses in the Paris Biennale des Antiquaires for its unique fusion of East and West that perfectly blended traditional Chinese culture with international aesthetic craftsmanship, as well as the classic beauty as a Chinese female designer.

This year, Diana once again plays with the elements of East and West to create “Orchid King” necklace that captures the unique oriental beauty of orchid for a noble and elegant style. This collection is perfectly in tune with Diana’s concept of “vitality in design” that fuses vivid personality in haute jewellery.

New Orchid King Necklace

Orchid is always a symbolic character of gentlemen chanted by Chinese scholars. Inspired by Su Dongpo’s poem " Orchid, with its king fragrance, grows in the deep valley. While a few are blooming in the early spring, even their sprigs are as fresh as if newly watered”, this collection beautifully depicts the silhouette of branches and buds of fresh orchids in spring. The spring orchid is highly regarded as the king of flower because of its scented aroma. Blossoming orchids and maturing buds softly hang on the greenery to illustrate a graceful and natural touch of nobility. Diana has spent two years of valuable time for hunting the most exceptional emeralds and diamonds for this collection.

The “Orchid King” necklace is composed of three no-oil collectible Columbia emeralds of 6.20 ct, 4.08 ct and 1.98ct respectively, and accompanied by more than 5,500 diamonds and 2,700 tsavorites setting on a colourful enamelled flower bezel in titanium and 18K gold.

“Orchid King” necklace can be detached as a brooch, a choker and hair accessory to match different occasions, offering a sense of sophisticated elegance. It also represents the nobility, amity, perfection, freedom and independence of Venus.

“One Year in China” Collection

Winter - Plum Blossom, King Of The Winter

The story inspired by the four seasons begins with winter. Growing up in the north and later living in the south, Diana has experienced the distinctive weather of cold and hot climate. The scene of red plum blossom in the courtyard in a snowy winter was unforgettable in her childhood. Everything is silent in the snowy white winter, while the plum blossoms splendidly bloom in the midst of the cold, showing a spread of red from afar.

With a year and a half of painstaking effort, Diana has selected the finest Burma pigeon blood ruby, which has been meticulously polished to brilliant cut without heat treatment, as the symbolic plum blossom. Carefully handpicked by the designer, each diamond is of exceptional quality with D to F colour and VS clarity.

This plum blossom hand piece can be detached as a bracelet, a brooch and two rings to match different occasions to demonstrate your versatile personalities - a determined business women in office, an elegant goddess at night banquet, a dutiful wife and loving mother at home, all presenting the true beauty of plum blossom. The earrings in this collection also resemble a spark of red that glister behind hair, reminiscing the aroma of plum blossom

Spring - Orchid Queen

Orchid is always a symbolic character of gentlemen chanted by Chinese scholars. Inspired by Su Dongpo’s poem " Orchid, with its king fragrance, grows in the deep valley. While a few are blooming in the early spring, even their sprigs are as fresh as if newly watered”, this collection beautifully depicts the silhouette of branches and buds of fresh orchids in spring. The spring orchid is highly regarded as the king of flower because of its scented aroma. Traditionally, orchid is always the symbol of elegance and nobleness. Despite the diversity of colours, the soft aroma of orchids represents the messenger of spring. Every orchid reveals a sense of purity with a refreshing touch of gentle breeze.

In this collection, the ring appears as flowers winding around your finger. With the same inspiration, the earrings also reveal its beauty with stems passing through the earlobe to illustrate the association of human and the nature.

Summer - Lotus After The Rain

Lotus presents a lofty sentiment of " coming from the ooze, yet remains stainless. Though baptized by ripples, still standing modest”. It represents the noble and virtuous personality of a lady. Diana had an impressive encounter with lotus in a previous journey. There was a refreshing scent and everything was thoroughly washed after a downpour. The clear drops of dew retaining on the flowers and lotus leaves reflected the golden beams of sunshine. This memorable scene is then transformed into this exceptional piece.

The designer uses 3.02ct European cut diamond with D colour and VS1 clarity as the raindrops. European cut diamonds, the long-time favourite items for collectors, become rare in the industry and such craftsmanship can only be found in vintage high jewellery nowadays. Distinctive to the brilliant cut, this diamond inherits the subtle luxury tradition of the 19th century.

Autumn - Dancing Red Leaves

Falling leaves signifies the coming of autumn, and the city changes its presence during the season. Wandering on the falling leaves with a crispy sound, we all know that autumn is here. The red leaves over the mountains under the Great Wall compose magnificent panorama in Beijing during the autumn. Moving along with the breeze, the wave of velvet red leaves create a stunning scenery in a sunny day. Red is a lucky colour in Chinese culture and it is widely used in celebrations from the old days up till now. Autumn is also a harvest time and red leaves symbolize the most traditional and richest Chinese culture.

The Falling Red Leaves collection is made of diamond cut pink sapphires with the finest colour, together with two 3 ct E/VS1 white diamonds to represent falling leaves and crystalized fruits respectively.

Year - Royal Bamboo

Bamboo is a plant with the strongest vitality. Poet Can Cen in Tang Dynasty once described in his poem " in the tough winter with withered grass and leaves, only the green bamboos grow robustly” that bamboo remained fresh and green despite the frigid and withered winter. Inspired by its evergreen feature, Diana uses bamboo as a symbol to give a complete conclusion to her collection. Chinese people regard bamboo as a spiritual plant with psychic power. In Chinese culture, the lucky bamboo is also a symbol of wealth and good fortune and people usually put six to eight stalks of bamboo for good luck and prosperous business. The Chinese pronunciation of eight is similar to the word ’fa’ (meaning wealth in Chinese), and thus bamboo is commonly used for having good wealth.

Diana has found this 8.88ct yellow diamond and immediately associated it with the Chinese lucky bamboo. She sacrificed part of the precious gem to match the carat as the lucky number of 888. She also filled the image of eight bamboos to her design to add the fourth “8” which implies a long-life good fortune.

www.dianazhangjewelry.com