When Anabela Chan visited the sapphire mines of Sri Lanka in 2012, the London-based jewelry designer had a moment that would change her life.
Though classically trained at the Royal College of Art and awarded by the Gemmological Association of Great Britain, what she saw underground—poor wages, harsh conditions, and wealth inequality—pushed her to rethink everything.
“They were mining some of the most precious commodities on the planet in some of the worst conditions,” she recalled. “It didn’t sit right with me.”
🌱 Back in London, Chan dove into material research—recycled metals, lab-grown gemstones, and eventually: food waste.
In 2020, she launched her first breakthrough: Blooms, a fine jewelry line made with recycled aluminum from soda cans, refined using techniques from the aeronautics industry.
But last month, she took that concept even further with the debut of Fruit Gems—a collection of vibrant, lab-grown stones synthesized from:
🥬 Spinach
🍠 Beetroot
🫐 Blueberries
🍇 Purple sweet potato
💙 Blue spirulina
🟢 Green plankton
🐉 Dragon fruit
“I was researching food waste and learned 40% of food in the West is discarded,” said Chan. “What if we could take these fruits and veggies beyond their shelf life and turn them into a new class of organic gemstones?”
In her London studio, she and her team used crushing, grinding, simmering, freeze-drying, and air-drying to extract rich natural pigments:
- Carotenoids (dragon fruit, tomato): red & orange
- Flavonoids (carrots, lemons): yellow
- Betalains (beetroot): red & purple
- Anthocyanins (blueberries, spirulina): blue
- Chlorophyll (spinach, plankton): green
✨ Her team then bonded the pigments into a bio-resin matrix using materials like corn, soybean, agave, and avocado seeds—giving the Fruit Gems real luster, strength, and the ability to be cut, faceted, and polished like traditional stones.
💎 Highlight pieces include:
- Elixir ring: lab-grown ruby + beetroot pigment – $1,666
- Begonia earrings: fuchsia sapphires + spirulina – $1,946
- Garden ring: orange sapphires + spinach & spirulina – $1,806
- Petunia earrings: emeralds + spirulina – $1,498
- Virosa mushroom earrings: pink sapphires + rose quartz – $1,526
🌿 Beyond Fruit Gems, Chan also launched Regenerative Gemstones, repurposing gem offcuts (amethyst, lapis, rose quartz) and infusing them with fallen autumn leaves and twigs for a surreal, woodland feel.
As a designer with a background in architecture, fashion (Alexander McQueen), and goldsmithing, Chan’s work merges organic storytelling with engineered elegance.
“The excitement,” she says, “is in always looking for ways to do new things.”
Her creations are proof that luxury can be beautiful, sustainable, and unexpectedly alive.