One of the things I've had to learn as a designer is when to say no. The Rolling Stones said it best: you can't always get what you want, and that's true.
A younger, people-pleasing version of me, eager to try my hand at anything, couldn't comprehend turning someone away, even when there was a quiet, nagging voice within telling me it wasn't a good idea. Some lessons had to be learnt during the early years of my career and, more often than not, they were learnt the hard way, on a path of most resistance.
It would usually go like this: someone would request stones or details that I knew would require so much care and attention to maintain. I would even vocalise this to the client, but I was also still holding onto that rigid customer service lie, "the customer is always right". So when they would insist that they wanted it the way they wanted it, I would say, of course.
I would make their jewellery, send it away in pristine condition and, in my head, as I left it with the courier, I would think, "I'm gonna be seeing that piece of jewellery again."
Lo and behold, six months later, the client returns. They did not abide by my care instructions, life got in the way as it so often does, and they have broken their jewellery.
Me, being (still to this day) a people pleaser, would offer to repair it free of charge. I would replace the stones, repolish, make it new, and thus, a biannual dance would begin. A cycle of me constantly fixing the thing I advised them not to buy, losing time, money and my mind in the process.
As I said, the lessons were learnt and, in the above instance, it only happened the once before I wised up. I now understand that to give the best service, to provide a customer with the best experience, it sometimes requires me to say no, to save them (and me) from a headache down the line.
For most of my career, the custom process has been seamless. People come to me, as they often have with most designers and craftspeople, for projects because there was an understanding that not only were they paying us to do the job, but that they were also paying for our expertise; a vast well of technical knowledge, material understanding and lived experience that would dictate how we approached their given brief.
A client explains what they want and I explain how we can make that happen, within the constraints of timeframes and budgets. I listen to their ideas, conjure up a range of designs and sometimes the client discovers details they would have never considered and loves them. They may even see the idea they thought they wanted made manifest in a design and decide, actually, it's not what they wanted.
That journey of designing together, of refining ideas until we have created the perfect piece for them, is one of my favourite parts of being a designer, and it's one of the best parts of buying custom work. We're building something that is yours and yours alone, brick by brick.
But in the last two years, I've noticed a real shift, and it's one I absolutely hate.
That has been the influx of AI designs that people send me. I understand why people do this. They assume it's just easier to show me what they want than describe it. But I need people to understand that just because AI can conjure it as a 2D image, it doesn't mean it will look good as a 3D product.
As someone with over 15 years combined experience as a fashion designer, a garment technologist and jeweller, when I look at things, I immediately begin dismantling them. As I look at these AI-generated images, a list begins forming inside my brain:
"A stone of that size and with that cut would never sit that low in such a thin ring, it needs clearance for the stone's pavilion."
"There's no way that could be properly finished or polished with that construction."
"That construction is going to be uncomfortable to wear."
"That part is not structurally sound."
"That design is too visually busy to fit in that space."
Then I have to explain to the client all of the above. The worst part is, because they have seen a final visual interpretation of their idea before we have even gone through a real process of design development, some have already grown attached and can't accept that it won't translate well to a finished item.
The biggest faux pas, in my opinion (and one that a lot of designers I know agree with), is when someone takes my existing product photos, designs, intellectual property, and puts them into chatgpt. I'm sent a frankenstein regurgitation of my own work and asked to replicate it.
Do not do this. Ever.
I have on more than one occasion, had to stop working with clients over this. One of the most recent examples was someone using chatgpt to change my engravings on a one-of-a-kind objet d'art pendant.
I explained that I could make something unique for them. However, after being sent multiple clip-art/my design/chatgpt merges, I explained what they wanted a) wouldn't fit right in the space and b) the line styles they wanted wouldn't translate well for the chosen design. I then had to politely tell them I wasn't the person for their project and not to use my work as reference.
That happened this year and was the first time that it had ever happened in my career, but I have noticed a pattern emerging when speaking to other artists, and it needs to stop.
It's not because I don't want people to have ideas, quite the opposite. I want people to bring me their ideas. I want to hear the strange, sentimental, half-formed ideas that they've been carrying around in their heads. I want to see the things that inspired them, the old objects they've found, the symbols or quotes that mean something to them, the jewellery they've inherited, the sketches they've scribbled down.
All of those things inspire me when I work on your project, so what I don't want is for the design process to be over before we've even started.
There is a difference between having a reference and having a finished answer. There is a difference between saying, "I love this particular detail" and handing me an AI-generated image and asking me to reproduce it. One gives me something to work with. The other gives us both something to work against.
And ultimately, this brings me back to learning when to say no. Sometimes saying no isn't bad customer service. Sometimes it is the most honest and responsible thing I can do as a designer. It means I am standing behind the years of experience that have taught me what will work, what won't, what will wear well, what will be structurally sound, and what will actually become the piece of jewellery you imagined. I want you to love that jewellery forever!
Custom jewellery isn't simply taking an image and turning it into metal. It is a process of interpretation, problem-solving, collaboration and craft. It is the conversation that happens between an idea and the person who knows how to make it real.
