Planning a wedding overseas is a beautiful thing to do. It is also, by most accounts, a logistical exercise in controlled chaos. Flights, venues, families, timelines - any one of them can shift without warning. When Xheni came to Micheli ahead of her wedding in Greece, she was carrying the quiet anxiety of someone holding a lot of moving pieces together.
Her ring, Alice made clear, would not be one of them.
The wedding band - Greece, June
Xheni knew what she wanted: an oval half eternity band in 18K yellow gold, low-set, the stones running in a clean unbroken line across her finger. Simple in intention, precise in execution.
What made this band particular was what happened before the setting even began. The oval diamonds weren’t selected off a stone list - they were custom cut to the exact dimensions specified: 14 stones at 5 × 3mm each, calibrated to sit consistently across the band. It’s the kind of detail that doesn’t announce itself in the finished piece, but that you feel. It's in the evenness of the line, the way each stone catches the light at the same angle.
Working with Alice through the design consultation, Xheni signed off on a band that was exactly what she’d imagined: warm yellow gold, soft oval curves, the profile sitting as close to the finger as the stones would allow. No excess. Nothing to snag. A ring made to be worn every day, starting in Greece.
With a strict collection date of June 19th, the band was completed and ready. One less thing to worry about, which, for a bride mid-wedding-planning, is not a small thing.
“Her ring, at least, she didn’t need to worry about.”
— Alice, design consultant
Wedding band specifications
|
Metal |
18K Yellow Gold throughout |
|
Style |
Oval half eternity |
|
Stones |
14 × oval-cut mined diamonds, custom cut to size |
|
Setting height |
As low as possible |
The return - the engagement ring remodel
A year later, Xheni was back. The wedding had happened. Greece had happened. And now, with her new band on her finger, she was looking at her engagement ring with fresh eyes.
The ring had a pear-shaped diamond she loved. But the two pieces weren’t quite speaking to each other - and Xheni had been sitting with an idea about why, and how to fix it.
Flip the pear on its side.
An east-west orientation - the stone running horizontally across the finger rather than pointing up, would change everything about how the ring sat alongside the band. More architectural. More intentional. And for Xheni, the direction carried its own meaning.
“East is where the sun rises from. It felt like the right direction.”
— Xheni
Working from that idea, Marc designed an 18K yellow gold east-west raised bezel and claw signet ring. The pear lifted and held in a bezel raised to honour the depth of the stone, secured by three bead claws. The orientation shifts the entire character of the ring: longer across the finger, lower in profile, the pointed tip of the pear now gesturing outward rather than up.
The shoulders carry their own quiet detail. Tapered baguette diamonds, flush-set on the outer edges of the band, invisible from the front.
They're for Xheni to know about. Not for anyone else.
The band tapers from the setting to 2.90mm at the side and 2.80mm at the base, with a domed outer profile. All in 18K yellow gold, so the remodelled ring and the wedding band finally share the same warmth, the same metal, the same language.
Engagement ring specifications
|
Metal |
18K Yellow Gold throughout |
|
Setting style |
East-west raised bezel with three bead claws |
|
Centre stone |
Pear-shaped diamond, east-west orientation |
|
Shoulder stones |
Tapered baguettes, flush set (hidden from front view) |
|
Band profile |
Dome outer profile |
A pair, with a year between them
The wedding band was made under pressure, with a date that couldn’t move and a bride who needed certainty. The remodelled ring was made slowly, with intention. A piece reconsidered after a year of marriage, of knowing herself better, of deciding which direction she wanted to face.
They weren’t designed together. But they belong together now. Two rings in the same gold, worn on the same hand, each one made at exactly the right moment.
If you have a ring you’d like to reimagine, or a deadline that can’t move, Micheli’s Melbourne studios are ready. Get in touch to start the conversation.
