Harakh Frangipani

With a focus almost exclusively on creating diamond confections, Harakh produces exquisite and breathtaking luxury jewelry. Each piece is a work of masterful expertise, from the firm’s elegant diamond stud earrings to its elaborate drop necklaces. 

Harakh Mehta — a fourth-generation jeweler — founded the company when he was 38. Having been immersed in diamond cutting and gemology since childhood, Mehta sought to elevate his family's reputation for excellence to new heights.

Harakh’s great-grandfather, Manilal Chandulal Mehta, began the family journey in 1916. As one of the first people of Indian heritage to establish a diamond office in Antwerp, he began supplying the royal family of South India with loose diamonds. Manatil Mehta's son Rasiklal Manilal Mehta opened a workshop to cut and polish diamonds in 1945. In 1972, Harakh's father Samir Mehta carried on the family tradition by opening his own business in Mumbai, and in 1980 Harakh's mother Nayna Mehta opened her workshop to begin designing diamond jewelry.

Harakh Mehta studied in the United States at the Gemological Institute of America. He moved back to Mumbai to learn all he could from his mother and father about grading diamonds and designing jewelry.

Mehta dreamed of creating exquisite jewelry that also represented the spirituality of his home country. His family encouraged him to pursue his passion, and Mehta opened his firm in New York City in 2017. Today Mehta is a partner in the family business, Bombay Jewellery Manufacturers, and operates an atelier in Mumbai — where he is based. There are also four Harakh boutiques in the United States. The firm’s founder frequently draws on nature in his designs and sets diamonds in platinum or 18-karat gold. The atelier produces less than 200 pieces annually.

In 2019, Le Bal, Paris named Harakh Mehta the official jeweler for that year's event, and in 2020, the designer won the New York Rising Star Award for fine jewelry. 

Find Harakh necklaces, rings and bracelets on 1stDibs.

Contemporary jewelry is inextricably linked with the moment in which it is created, frequently reflecting current social, cultural and political issues such as environmental consciousness, identity and sustainability. It’s informed by fashion trends, from the chokers of the 1990s to the large chain necklaces of the early 2000s.

Jewelry is one of the oldest forms of adornment. Lockets made of silver or gold have been treasured gifts for hundreds of years, for example, and charm bracelets, which have existed since prehistoric times, didn’t become especially popular until the 19th-century reign of Queen Victoria. For many centuries, fine jewelry was used primarily to express wealth or status through lavish materials. Then, in the 1960s, a concept known as the “critique of preciousness” emerged, with jewelers creating pieces that did not get their value from gemstones or precious metals. Instead, it was the jeweler’s artistic vision that was prized and elevated.

This shift still informs Contemporary jewelry being made by artists today. Whether they are using cheap, found materials and working with provocative geometric shapes or seeking out the rarest stones, they are imbuing their work with meaning through their skills, techniques and ideas. Innovative designers such as Elsa Peretti, who popularized sculptural sterling-silver jewelry for Tiffany & Co., and David Yurman, who twisted metal into the simple yet striking Cable bracelet, have also influenced the direction of Contemporary jewelry’s forms and aesthetics.

Meanwhile, technological advancements like metal alloys and laser engraving have led to new possibilities in jewelry design. Now, edgy makers and brands as well as minimalist designers are pushing Contemporary jewelry forward into the 21st century.

Find a collection of Contemporary rings, earrings, necklaces and other jewelry on 1stDibs.