JUVELIRY URALA

OJSC 'Juveliry Urala', one of the sector's oldest enterprises, not only cherishes and upholds the time-hallowed traditions of old artificers but also develops and improves the methods and techniques for working precious metals and gems. Singular and fascinating designs, elegance, beauty and high product quality are the hallmarks of the jewelry made by the plant's craftsmen. The first jewelry articles were crafted at the Sverdlovsk Jewelry Plant (originally a gem-cutting and mineral-working factory) to sketches by artisan V.G. Roshchin, who started working as a craftsman in a workshop attached to the Imperial Palace, the fine and sophisticated art of filigree was mastered by the plant in 1958, in the 1960s articles made from silver with semiprecious stones were added to the product range. The 'Kavkaz' silver brooch adorned with a jasper was pronounced the best article at the 1961 Paris International Exhibition. The discovery of diamonds in Yakutia in 1954 and the mastery of cutting and setting diamonds whose commercial production was launched on the basis of the Sverdlovsk gem-cutting and mineral-working factory made a veritable revolution in the art of jewelry-making. The technology of artificially growing emeralds developed and mastered jointly with the Novosibirsk Institute of Geology and Geophysics under the USSR Academy of Sciences marked a milestone in the plant's history. Synthetic diamonds were first produced in 1976. The plant's excellent collective of artists and designers has been in a constant search for new exquisite and commercially attractive examples of jewelry. The widening of the product range has been a strong incentive to development of highly productive modern equipment. A line for the production of chains and bracelets from gold, a technology for treatment of objects or 'workpieces' with diamond dust and manufacture of hollow articles, a laser installation for making cameos... Such is a far-from-complete list of the innovations introduced into the production process.

The Sverdlovsk Jewelry-Making Plant has taken part in more than 60 exhibitions, held in Paris, Montreal and Tokyo, and it emerged the winner on quite a few occasions. Yelena Opaleva placed first at the world's most prestigious contest of jewellers-designers, 'Diamonds-96' (London), sponsored and held by 'De Beers'. The necklace she made, called the 'Giza Sphynx', studded with 700 diamonds, presented the Uras jewelry school to the international public for the first time in the history of Russian jewelry art.

The plant became a joint-stock company in 1992; the Finance and Industry Group 'Dragotsennosti Urala' (Ural Jewels) has brought together the leading Urals goldmining tycoons. It has the goal of developing the goldmining complex not only in the Ural-Siberian Region but throughout Russia.