Jewelers Mallorca and Andalusia

A bespoke commission takes three to six weeks from approved design to delivery, with a deposit of thirty to fifty per cent and a point of no return at the moment casting begins.

There is no rule about how much to spend: the usual range in Spain runs from nine hundred to two thousand five hundred euros, and the decision that matters is how the budget is divided between cut quality, setting and correct sizing.

The number stamped on a piece states how many parts per thousand of it are pure precious metal, so 750 means eighteen carat gold at seventy five per cent purity and 925 means sterling silver at ninety two and a half per cent.

Jewellery is valued differently depending on the purpose: replacement value for insurance, market value for inheritance and division of an estate, and realisation value for a forced sale, and using the wrong figure either overpays premiums or overstates a tax base.

A Majorca pearl is a manufactured pearl produced on the island since the early twentieth century by building successive layers of nacreous essence onto a core, so it is neither a natural pearl nor one cultivated in a mollusc.

The Spanish ring size equals the internal circumference of the ring in millimetres minus forty, so a band of fifty two millimetres circumference is a Spanish size twelve, a US size six and a UK size L and a half.