Buying wedding rings in Italy

benjus

This probably won't be useful to many people, but I thought I'd mention it.

We were recently on holiday in Puglia, Italy. As we're getting married in September we thought we'd have a look for some rings there, and a friend who lives locally recommended a jeweller in a small town in deep SE Italy.

The jeweller was great - he spent about an hour with us going over the design, which ended up as 18ct yellow gold with details in 18ct white gold, and engraved on the inside. He ordered the basic yellow gold rings from a supplier, then customised them himself to our design.

All of this came to the princely sum of £400 for both rings, weighing 12.7g in total. He didn't ask for any deposit or downpayment; he emailed us photos of the rings after he'd finished working on them, then we wired him the money (via Transferwise) and he sent us the rings.

I guess this won't be an option for most people, but it's worth thinking about getting expensive items like rings from somewhere cheaper - especially if you are there anyway and can get a good local recommendation. If you want to talk to this specific jeweller PM me for his details, although you'll need to speak Italian.