Nuptial jewellery has a long tradition, and the engagement ring is certainly thought of as an eminent item of part of it. The Birmingham Jewellery Quarter is packed with superbly gifted craftsman and jewellers. In fact, Birmingham jewellers still make an estimated 40% of the U.K’s native high end jewellery.
A delightful side to the community of the Birmingham Jewellery Quarter is that our jewellers are able to chatter about all the latest trends and industry developments. Recently, more couples than ever have made it clear that their budgets won’t be going on smaller diamonds in favour of a big wedding, but will be used as investments in something stunning and valuable.
Modern marrying couples are older than ever. The average marriage ages for men and women respectively are now thirty-six and thirty-three. These are people with disposable incomes and a decent wage coming into the household. Many of them will have lived together before marriage and perhaps bought their home. They’re not the poor, struggling young people newly engaged couples once were (both men and women were in their early twenties when they married back in the 1950s) and are therefore electing to put their money where their engagement rings are!
Diamonds make one of the safest investments in the world, so it makes perfect sense that marrying couples are electing to seal their love with a sound investment; after all, they’ve already got the house, the cat and the joint pension!