Reflecting on the State of Sustainability in the Jewellery Industry Conference
Almost 10 years on from Fair Luxury’s first conference in 2016, the 2025 conference was a resounding success and featured crucial voices from around the world, and here in the UK. The speakers and panelists reflected on the intervening years across the mining of gold and gemstones, human rights and conditions, as well as panel discussions exploring carbon emissions, sustainable manufacturing and responsible marketing and communications.
The Fair Luxury Conference was programmed in collaboration with the Goldsmiths’ Centre and we cannot thank them enough for championing this cause. Of the event, Fair Luxury team member and organiser Rebecca Maddock said “the aim was to cover some topics which aren’t regularly touched upon at events like these. Our hope was that opening up discussions around greenwashing, carbon reduction and UK manufacturing would empower jewellers and directly impact the day-to-day decisions they make in their businesses.”
The day was led by the extraordinary Anna Loucah, Fair Luxury team member and host of previous in-person events, in keeping with the continuity of purpose Fair Luxury strives for. In the opening section of the day we heard from four experts in various topics from around the world.
Photography by Julia Skupny
First up was Cristina Villegas via video link, Founder and Director of Nature’s Wealth. She spoke about how responsible sourcing has evolved and the impact it is having on mining communities around the world. In the big picture and at the artisanal mining level, lack of knowledge is still weighted against the as miners - leaves them vulnerable to exploitation - so knowledge is power.
Photography by Julia Skupny
By way of prerecorded presentation, Toby Pomeroy, founder of Mercury Free Mining, spoke about their work to eliminate mercury from artisanal gold mining. A movement born out of that fact that he simply couldn’t carry on in the industry without working for change once he knew how dirty sourcing can be.
Photography by Julia Skupny
Joanna Hardy, spoke about her personal reflections on visiting gemstone mines. Her words were powerful, reminding us of the humans in our supply-chains and the histories and hard work which are a part of the gemstones we work with daily. The problem is the exploitation - people coming in and taking advantage of vulnerability.
Photography by Julia Skupny
Finally, Greg Valerio, jeweller and social activist and founder of PeaceGold, spoke about his aim to us gold as a tool for peace building and social regeneration in post-conflict regions. We have power when we connect with miners. There is a need for a different structure and economic model to deliver sustainable transformation & keep wealth and value with miners - we need to think circular not linear.
The first panel discussion of the day focused on carbon emissions. From supply chain emissions to workshop energy use, this conversation is complex and often overlooked in discussions around sustainability, hence the necessity to cover it. The panel comprised of two cardon reduction specialists, Charlie Cotton of ecollective, Chris Hocknell of Eight Versa, as well as Jos Skeates, founder of EC One and jewellery designer Saskia Shgutt. The panel was moderated by jeweller Susi Smither, founder of The Rock Hound and Fair Luxury team member.
In response to this panel, Fair Luxury team member Rachel Sweeney of Cox & Power said it’s a good exercise to“think about the carbon footprint of each piece of jewellery – acknowledge raw materials are where our biggest footprint is – even despite this, if we can tell our clients this info it creates more transparency and sets our jewellery apart from other work with no provenance.”
Our second panel featured speakers from the world of manufacturing. The discussion centred around responsible production, what has been achieved in recent years and what needs continued improvement into the future. Charlotte Dew of The Goldsmiths’ Centre moderated this panel featuring Alex Monroe, Aastha Sethi, Head of Sustainability at Boodles, Kerry Sounders, Operations director at Weston Beamor, and Gary Wroe of Hockley Mint and Managing Director and President of National Association Jewellers. The consensus among the panel was that improvements in responsibility within manufacturers comes primarily from within rather than from customers.
Brighton based jewellery designer Rebekah Ann was struck by this. She commented,"what struck me most throughout the day was how much of the meaningful change in our industry seems to come from within, from business owners, companies and makers themselves, rather than being customer-driven." Rebekah Anna spoke on our Responsible Communications and Greenwashing panel and was an invaluable voice for independent jewellers. If you want to hear more of here thoughts on the day you can check out her blog post.
The third and final panel session centred around responsible marketing and greenwashing. It was moderated by Rebecca Maddock, founder of &Worn Studio, a creative consultancy supporting jewellers and small brands. The panel was made up of PR expert Emma Beckett, founder of EBPR, standing in for Katie Gillespie, Compliance and Policy Manager at the National Association of Jewellers was Ben Massey, CEO of the National Association of Jewellers, Jamie Moore, marketing manager of Positive Luxury, and independent jeweller Rebekah Ann, founder of Rebekah Ann Jewellery.
Brussels based designer Saskia Shutt reflected on this panel by saying, "the biggest takeaway for me was around communication — and how we use language. The word “sustainability” is everywhere. It’s on websites, in captions, in conversations. But what does it really mean?” If you would like to hear more from Saskia about her experience at the conference you can read her full blog post about it.
Referencing in-person events prior to the 2020 pandemic, traceable gemstone expert Stuart Pool, co-founder of Nineteen48 said “I felt that the conference was a strong return to in real life events for Fair Luxury, thanks to the huge effort that Rebecca Maddock put into planning it. We showed that we had considered how to be relevant to the modern audience, both the old-hands and the newcomers.” He went on to say “the comments have been overwhelmingly positive… a valuable contribution to the ongoing sustainability discussion in our industry. Two of my customers have mentioned that they are already planning things for their businesses because of what they learnt at the conference.” This, over everything else, was the aim of the conference. To inspire people to take positive steps in their businesses towards our shared goal of a fairer, more transparent and eco-conscious jewellery industry.
But discussions can only do so much for this movement. Speaking critically, Victoria Waugh, founder of Considered Jewellery and VV collective said the aim should be to reach beyond reflection on what has, and what is happening in our industry “to drive continued discussion beyond the conference.” If you attended, we hope you will consider what your takeaways were? Will you be making changes in your business based on these discussions?
Fair Luxury always endeavours to re-injected momentum into the, often fraught, discussion around ethics and sustainability in the jewellery industry but the work continues. Take small steps in the right direction and the movement will continue to gain traction.
Finally, an especially huge thank you goes to Charlotte, Erin, Isabel, Kay and the rest of the team at the Goldsmiths’ Centre for all their support through the planning of the conference. And thanks to photographer Julia Skupny for capturing the day beautifully.
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