Stephen M. Avery: Celebrating Half a Century in Gem Cutting
Approaching his 50th anniversary in the business, Stephen M. Avery (Lakewood, Colorado) reflected on his journey to becoming an award-winning lapidary artist, detailing his signature cuts and gem sets and offering advice to up-and-coming gemstone cutters. Since starting his career at the age of 17, Avery has accumulated a remarkable amount of cutting experience. But even after all this time, the part he enjoys most is continuing to find new challenges.
Avery was not born into the business and began his career by enrolling in the American School of Diamond Cutting. He learned the foundations of diamond cutting from the prestigious diamond cutter Leonard Ludel. A few years later, he found himself working for Stradley Lapidary in Colorado, where he made the instinctual move from diamonds to colored stones. He describes this as a moment of clarity, as he was bored with the lack of creativity in cutting standard round brilliant diamonds. Avery noted that at the beginning of his career in the late 1970s, he was “bringing something unknown to the colored stones business: diamond cutting quality to colored gemstones.”
Avery started to create gem sets—suites of intricately cut gemstones that fit perfectly together (figure 1)—about 40 years ago. He describes them as something that started experimentally and has exploded in popularity. When it comes to creating his gem sets and sourcing the right stones, he has learned that patience pays off. He explained that some colors will negatively impact other colors, and some colors when paired will read neutral. The most gratifying outcome occurs when all the gemstones used look better when they’re together.
Throughout his career, Avery has fashioned numerous signature cuts. His very first signature cut was a Portuguese-cut trilliant, which took three years to design. Another early signature cut was the Triopp cut (figure 2), a triangular cut born out of anger when the perfect trillion preform had an inclusion in the corner. He ground it out, only to discover a completely new concept in faceting. He then went on to create the OVOB cut, an oval opposed bar cut, and most recently the Diamondback, a recreation of the checkerboard cut to fit elongated pieces of gem rough (figure 3).
His exquisite attention to detail and understanding of color and light enable Avery to cut award-winning, one-of-a-kind faceted gemstones. The majority of his pieces require designers to create custom settings. He has relationships with several skillful designers who allow him to share his vision for the piece and then take it from there. His talent, in combination with the talent of these designers, has earned him many “Best Of” titles in the AGTA Spectrum Awards. Avery cut a matching pair of Afghanistan indicolite tourmalines that were 2018 AGTA Cutting Edge Awards first-place winners in Pairs and Suites. The following year, those same tourmalines won yet again in the Spectrum Awards, in earrings designed by Adam Neeley (figure 4).
Avery shared his advice for emerging gem cutters: “Learn all the techniques, then challenge the rules. If you want to do something and you don’t have the technique, you’re going to have to invent it. And that’s okay—it just hasn’t been done because you didn’t do it yet.”
