How Emily Ratajkowski’s traumatic breakup revolutionized jewelry

A study that came out a few years ago came to a singular conclusion: the more expensive the ring, the quicker the divorce. Sometimes, couples don’t even make it to the wedding: such was the case of Jennifer Lopez and Ben Affleck the first time they got engaged. The $2.5 million pricetag of Lopez’s custom Harry Winston 6.1-carat rose diamond ring wasn’t enough to ward off the dissolution of their engagement. Eventually it became public knowledge that Lopez meant to return the ring to her then-ex-partner, but that was the last anyone heard of the matter. Truly, there’s no manual on what to do with your ring after breaking off a relationship. The answer to the question is personal and valid, and may lead to returning it, squirreling it away, selling it or transforming the gem into another piece entirely. According to jewelers, this latter method is far from new — though in recent years, it’s become an increasingly popular option.

A few days ago, model Emily Ratajkowski (who finalized her divorce with producer Sebastian Bear-McClard over his infidelities) proudly shared on Instagram that she had created a pair of “divorce rings” from her wedding ring’s pear- and princess-cut diamonds. The same New York jeweler who had designed Ratajkowski’s original ring, Alison Chemla of the brand Alison Lou, created the new pieces. Their photos have already received more than a million “likes”, but the impact of her announcement has reached even further: “Divorce rings are having a moment,” announced The New York Times.

Ratajkowski is one of the influencers who are driving a change in the way we talk about divorce, one being made visible through the reutilization of wedding rings. In an interview with Vogue UK, the model tells how her refashioned rings are highly symbolic, a kind of proof of how her life had become her own once again. When she put them on for the first time, Ratajkowski says she felt the power of using accessories to change one’s narrative around divorce, and of moving on. “It’s been a crazy couple of years, and finally I feel a sense of peace within myself and about the life and future I have and will continue to build with my son,” she says. “Somehow, these rings feel like a reminder that I can make myself happy in ways I never imagined.”

A similar conclusion was reached this month by Sofía (not her real name). A longtime client at Madrid jeweler Nicols, Sofía came to the shop this time with a special request: now divorced, she wanted to refashion her ring with other gems, like a green emerald, that carried with them new meanings. Aside from this metamorphosis, Sofía had made another important modification: she changed the finger on which she wore the piece. Instead of continuing to sport it on her ring finger, traditionally related to matrimony, it now sits on her index finger, “the power finger”. With this gesture, she looks to evoke “the power of the future, of continuing to move forward and learning about life.”

In the Joyerías Nicols workshop, artisans have been remodeling pieces in this manner “since forever”, vice president and commercial direction Sani Nicolás tells EL PAÍS. “The divorce ring has always been around, but the big difference now is that as many men as women feel proud of their change in status and of the learning they’ve gained through the relationship. Nowadays, instead of selling them, they are refashioning them,” says Nicolás, whose business has been in his family for three generations, and which opened its first boutique in Madrid’s Salamanca neighborhood in 1978. “With the rise in divorces and this new trend, people no longer want to hide their divorce or their engagement ring, but rather the opposite, to say, ‘Hey, I value this, I have learned, I’m growing, I’m probably taking very beautiful things from this relationship — especially if there are kids — but I’m in a different moment. I’m free and I want this ring not only to remind me of the commitment we shared and has now been broken, but also all the learning that in some ways we did as a couple, and how this new situation is launching us into a world that is full of possibilities,’” he says.

In the experience of Nicolás, when people decide to refashion their ring, they change it completely, whether that’s with other gems or shapes, and that in addition to creating new rings, some are refashioning such pieces into chain necklaces that hang down to the heart to impart new symbology. Prices for these transformations start at $532 for two classic 18-carat gold wedding rings, though the maximum price is up to the client, depending on how far they want to go. Those whose endings have been less than amicable, the jeweler says, usually prefer to sell the stones and be done with them, often buying another piece of jewelry to celebrate their new life chapter. When it comes to these new gems, they tend to avoid diamonds (which have been associated with eternal love since the DeBeers marketing campaign launched a century ago that popularized the phrase “a diamond is forever”). Sapphires, emeralds and rubies are more common choices for celebrating a divorce.

The path that Marta (also, not her real name) took in refashioning her wedding has been longer, but ultimately arrived at the same place. After 11 years of divorce and 11 years of marriage, “there was no longer any bitterness or guilt” associated with her diamond ring, nor that of her former husband’s, a classic half-round band that she had wound up with. “I don’t want to deny the past, I’m not ashamed of it”—in fact, she looked back at their time together with gratitude. She had realized that she had “experienced a great lesson”. Now that she had achieved everything she wanted through being on her own, the moment had arrived to do something with the rings. So, she went to the MIGAYO workshop in the center of Madrid. Celia Gayo, its jeweler and founder, has transformed numerous such pieces in the seven years of her brand’s existence, and from the beginning she was clear that divorce rings had to be a celebration of self-love. “I wanted a ring that would remind [Marta] of two things: to never forget her inner shine, which nothing and no one can extinguish (represented by a central, rose-cut diamond that sparkles subtly), and that her path goes on and that she still has a lot to learn (which I represented by setting her wedding diamonds in such a way that they are partially hidden by the band, though still visible, in process). The gold band was fluid, I wanted it to be clear that it came from melting the metal and that it adapted to what came its way, without a defined, hard shape,” Gayo tells EL PAÍS. In her workshop, located in the capital’s Mariano de Cavia plaza, the price of such modifications lies between $851 and $1,597.

Sara (a pseudonym) came to the workshop with her engagement and wedding. Her marriage had broken up some time ago, but she shared her daughter María (not her real name) with her former partner. The mother didn’t want to wear the rings anymore, but she thought it made sense for her daughter to have them, only, in a new form. She decided to refashion the three pieces into a new ring, a piece that would hold a powerful significance because, as Gayo explains, “you wear it on your hands, which are always in front of you, reminding you of what you want.”

This revindication of life after divorce through jewelry opens two doors: one is that jewelers, as Vogue Business pointed out, are finding new business in divorced clients. And secondly, it confirms a trend of socially and culturally recontextualizing divorce. Such has been the path of Lauren Boc, a jeweler with a New York showroom who is the founder of Hera Fine Jewelry, and who in October was surprised to be served with divorce papers just four months after her wedding. She decided to refashion her emerald-and-diamond ring alongside her life itself, and shared her experience on social media. Since the fall, requests for divorce jewelry have risen by 300%.

Historically, divorce rings have been seen as “mournful jewels”, says Rachel Church, author and former jewelry curator of London’s Victoria and Albert Museum, in The New York Times. Their goal, she says is to send a social message through which people will know that they should not ask how one’s husband is doing. Modern rings, however, are not an expression of mourning, and bring new meaning to divorce.

Jewelry is the latest expression of a phenomenon that has been forming for some time. In October 1984, EL PAÍS published an article entitled “Las fiestas para conmemorar el divorcio hacen furor en la costa oeste de Estados Unidos” (Divorce parties are causing a stir on the West Coast of the United States), which told how recent Los Angeles divorcees were renting jukeboxes, playing songs from their married years and dancing like crazy. Some symbols of mourning were to be found in these celebrations, such as black curtains covering the walls, but people “have a good time”, declared a representative from a company that organized such gatherings to celebrate signing the divorce papers.

Four decades later, divorce continues to be a process met with feelings of shame and loss. But, as Christine Gallagher, author of The Divorce Party Handbook, points out in an article on the subject in EL PAÍS, “before, divorced people were on their own, as if they were ashamed of having failed, which increased their stress. The party is a way of airing out what happened, and at the same time, friends help one to get through this difficult moment in life. Rituals can be very powerful and effective.” Now that the term “divorcee” is experiencing a comeback in the lexicon of young people, reshaping its meaning and wearing it with pride as proof of self-love after a breakup may just be the new language for overcoming heartbreak.

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