The Ring

You’ve seen the ring. You know what it looks like. But do you know how it came to be? No, it wasn’t made from the fires of Mount Doom, in Mordor. Trust me, this is not the one ring to rule them all (took the use of this LOTR quote from one of Chris Pirillo’s vlogs). It did however, require a lot of effort to put together.

Initially, the idea was just to get a ring from a jewelry store. However, I couldn’t find a sapphire that was round in shape. Most shops had them shaped like an egg. Plus they were placed on a ring with a star-shaped crown. While it did look fancy, it was a design that was all too common. Practically almost every store had one in varying sizes. Thankfully, my Uncle Ponch - who accompanied me the whole time I was having the ring made - offered a solution: build the damn thing from scratch.  

First, the stone. We went to different jewelry stores asking if they sold loose stones. As expected, most of them said no. Those that did say yes weren’t able to give us something as big as the one my uncle and I got. Luckily, we found what we were looking for in Greenhills, of all places. Had that failed, we probably would’ve ended up somewhere in Binondo, which was something I really didn’t want to put myself through. With the “rock” secured, we moved on to the next item on the list - the ring itself.

The design of the ring just had to be simple. So aside from the images sent to me by Julls (I asked her before about what types of rings she might like, if ever), I gathered a couple more to bring with me when I canvassed for someone who could make it. Unfortunately, showing them an image compared to an actual sample proved to be quite difficult since I had to explain to them the size and how I really wanted it to look. In the end, Uncle Ponch offered his take on this problem - buy an actual sample. So I headed to Forever 21 since Julls often bought rings there and since she also  told me her ring size from that shop. (Disclaimer: I have yet to find that ring I bought. Jeez).

Buying a sample made it a lot easier for me to talk to jewelry makers since all I had to do was just show them the ring and they’d give me an estimate. So where did I end up having the ring made? In a funny twist, I ended up going back to Greenhills, to a shop that was recommended by the store I got the stone from. As planned, I showed them the sample I got but instead of having the shape copied exactly, I opted to have the promise ring Julls and I bought back in 1999 copied so that once she wore the engagement ring, it would blend well with her promise ring.

The ring took almost a week to make but it was worth it especially when I saw the almost-finished product. The only thing left to do when my uncle and I returned for it was to put the stone in and clean the ring. For those who want to know what actually occurs when a ring is forged from the fires of Mt. Doom…I mean…made in a shop in Greenhills, here are some pics I took. Again, it was my Uncle Ponch who  advised me - in a very commanding voice you couldn’t say no to for fear of being wiped off this earth - to take pictures for posterity. Good thing I listened. Well, I did, more out of fear.

Note: I took the pictures using my phone so they’re really not that sharp.

There you have it, the story behind how Julls’ engagement ring got made. It took a lot in terms of effort but judging by how it looks, I think we did pretty well.