Jewellery & systems
Parametric jewellery design with GEMFORM
GEMFORM connects my interest in gemstones with my work on practical design tools. Its starting point is a collection of stones with actual dimensions, followed by the settings, repeated elements and assembly logic needed to develop an object around them.
Start with the stones
A stone is both a visual choice and a physical constraint. Length, width, depth, outline and orientation influence the surrounding design. A sequence that looks coherent in a sketch still has to make sense as an arrangement of objects with different dimensions.
The stones-first approach keeps those facts close to the design decisions. Colour and rhythm remain important, but they are developed alongside the geometry instead of being detached from it.
Make repetition explicit
Jewellery often builds a larger form from repeated settings, linked elements or related motifs. A parametric description makes the relationships between those components explicit. Changing a dimension can then be considered in relation to the assembly.
An articulated coloured-stone design illustrates the kinds of questions involved: the scale of adjacent elements, their order, the space between them and the way the sequence hangs. The image on this page is a design study; it is not presented as proof of a particular software output.
A bridge into engineering
GEMFORM’s role is to develop the design and assembly before the engineering handoff. It connects a visual proposal with the information a later modelling and fabrication stage needs to resolve.
The broader jewellery practice includes looking at stones, selecting proportions, modelling and considering construction. GEMFORM concentrates on the stage where those choices need to become a coherent, inspectable design.