The weather is warming up and people are pulling out their most colorful clothes to celebrate the return of spring. This is the perfect time for us to highlight one of our favorite designers, Alberto Parada.
Alberto Parada is a Washington, D.C.-based designer. His family comes from South America and he travels frequently to Paraguay and Uruguay. This background, with a foot in two cultures, is what makes his aesthetic so bold and fashion-forward, without being too over-the-top for daily wear.
Ethical Design
Parada is a leader in the sustainable fine jewelry movement. He uses only fair-trade gems, conflict-free diamonds, and reclaimed gold in his designs.
Widely travelled, he avoids the “in-the-box” thinking of many designers. While sophisticated and attention-getting, his designs have a mysterious, almost exotic allure, because of his unique combinations of shapes and materials.
Original and Innovative
It’s rare to find a jewelry designer who can balance successfully between “attention-getting” and “fine detailing,” but Parada has this skill in spades. You will notice a woman wearing his designs, and then you will catch yourself staring as you examine the workmanship. This is even more apparent when you look at his collections. Most collections are variations on a theme. The same is true of Parada’s collections, but the breadth of his variations are what make him stand out. Signature is a prime example of how creative he is within the theme he is working on.
Floating is another innovative collection. These designs feature stones that are not set, but merely restrained along a track. Garnet, blue topaz, and white quartz are gloriously highlighted in rose or white gold settings.
Perhaps it is his use of color that makes Alberto Parada’s collections so memorable. He uses a wide variety of metals, sometimes in the same piece, sometimes alone. His choice of colors is divine. A particular favorite is the pink sapphire ring in his Modern collection, a thick, solid rose gold with a seductive cutaway bordered with small diamonds. Each of these elements would make for a beautiful ring on its own, but in this combination, the ring is truly memorable.
Aside from pink sapphires, you will find garnet, citrine, topaz, labradorite, carnelian, Brazilian agate, blue chalcedony and more. If you find colorful jewelry hard to wear or hard to find, take a look at Parada’s designs and you’re sure to find something you will fall in love with.
Come down to Midtown Jewelers to check out the Alberto Parada collection and see for yourself how bold, unique and innovative fine jewelry can be!