Crafting Life’s Milestones Since 1924

In Windsor, California

 

For our family, jewelry has never simply been a business. It is a trade, a craft, and a tradition that has been passed from one generation to the next for more than a century.

Our family’s history in the jewelry industry began in 1924, making today’s Vintage Jewelers part of a four-generation jewelry legacy.

Four Generations in the Jewelry Business

Our roots reach back to the early days of professional gemological education in America. My grandfather was among the early students of gemology and studied alongside Robert M. Shipley, who would go on to found the Gemological Institute of America (GIA). Their friendship and shared interest in gemology became part of a family tradition of jewelry education that continued through the generations.

Both of my parents pursued GIA education as well, and growing up in the jewelry business meant that jewelry was part of my life from an early age. I made my first ring when I was around 12 years old, but by my early twenties I knew that I wanted to make the family trade my career.

I attended the Gemological Institute of America, completing the Graduate Jeweler program in bench jewelry manufacturing as well as the Applied Jewelry Arts program in jewelry design.

After GIA, I apprenticed in the Palm Desert area at a jewelry manufacturing shop specializing in handmade 22-karat gold jewelry. I worked as part of the wax-carving and manufacturing team, gaining hands-on experience in the traditional processes of designing, casting, assembling, finishing and producing fine jewelry.

Those years at the bench helped shape the philosophy we still follow today: understand how jewelry is made, understand the materials you're working with, and do the work correctly.

Vintage Jewelers

Vintage Jewelers has been serving our community from the same Windsor location, next to the post office, since 1992.

Today, we combine that long history of traditional jewelry craftsmanship with technology that earlier generations of our family could hardly have imagined.

Our fully equipped shop allows us to perform a wide range of jewelry services on location, including jewelry repair, custom design and manufacturing, stone setting, hand engraving, laser welding, laser engraving, appraisals, gemstone identification, precious-metal testing, pearl and bead restringing, and watch services.

For custom jewelry, we can take an idea from the first sketch through CAD design, create realistic computer renderings, produce a 3D-printed model for approval, cast the piece, finish it and set the gemstones.

For repairs, jewelry is carefully inspected under magnification before work begins. Having experienced jewelers and modern equipment in our own shop allows us to tackle everything from routine ring sizing and chain repair to complex restoration and fabrication.

Old-World Craftsmanship Meets Modern Technology

The tools have changed considerably since our family entered the jewelry trade in 1924, but our commitment to understanding the craft has not.

Alongside traditional jeweler's benches, microscopes and hand tools, our shop now uses advanced equipment including CAD and 3D printing, laser welding, a fiber laser engraving and cutting system, X-ray fluorescence (XRF) precious-metal analysis, and Raman and photoluminescence spectroscopy for advanced gemstone identification.

These technologies allow us to work with a level of precision and information that simply wasn't available to previous generations of jewelers.

Our XRF analyzer can non-destructively determine the elemental composition of precious-metal alloys. Our Raman and photoluminescence spectrometer provides another level of analytical testing for gemstones beyond the traditional instruments normally found in a jewelry store.

We believe technology is most valuable when it is paired with the knowledge and hands-on experience necessary to understand what the results actually mean.

More Than Selling Jewelry

A full-service jeweler should be able to do more than sell you something from a showcase.

We sell both new and estate fine jewelry, create one-of-a-kind custom pieces, restore jewelry that has already lived through generations, service watches, perform appraisals, identify gemstones, test precious metals, and purchase gold, silver, platinum, coins, jewelry and select luxury watches.

Sometimes our job is creating an engagement ring that marks the beginning of a marriage. Other times, it's rebuilding a worn family ring so another generation can wear it.

We've repaired jewelry damaged by decades of wear, recreated missing pieces, restored family heirlooms, designed jewelry around gemstones that have been sitting in a drawer for years, and created entirely new pieces intended to become tomorrow's heirlooms.

Carrying the Trade Forward

After four generations, we understand that the jewelry trade only survives when its knowledge is passed on.

Jewelry manufacturing, stone setting, gemology, engraving, repair and restoration are skills learned through education, repetition, problem solving and years of hands-on experience. We believe preserving those skills—and passing them on—is an important part of our responsibility to the jewelry industry.

Today, that tradition continues with a new generation at Vintage Jewelers. Carlos Figueroa, our Bench Jeweler, and Chloe Jones, our Jewelry Concierge and Buyer, have become incredible additions to our team. Both are building their careers in the jewelry industry while learning the knowledge and skills that have traditionally been passed from one generation of jewelers to the next.

Carlos has developed his skills at the jeweler's bench, learning jewelry repair, fabrication, stone setting and gemstone identification while continuing to expand his knowledge of gemology.

Chloe is developing her expertise in jewelry, gemstones, precious metals, buying and working directly with customers. She is also learning jewelry design, developing an understanding of how a piece progresses from an idea into something that can actually be manufactured and worn. This gives her the opportunity to learn both the creative and technical sides of jewelry while building the knowledge necessary to help customers confidently with everything from selecting a piece of jewelry to developing a custom design.

We continue to teach them what generations before us taught us, while encouraging them to pursue their own education, specialties and interests within the industry. At the same time, they bring new ideas, perspectives and enthusiasm to the shop that help move Vintage Jewelers forward.

To us, carrying on a legacy doesn't mean simply doing things the way they've always been done. It means preserving the knowledge and craftsmanship worth keeping, embracing better technology and new ideas, and making sure the next generation has the skills to carry the trade forward.

More than a century after our family's journey in jewelry began, we're still learning, still teaching, and still practicing the craft at the bench.

The tools may change from one generation to the next.

The craft continues.

Brendan Thielman

Vintage Jewelers
Crafting Life’s Milestones Since 1924