Gem setting means cutting a seat, or recess, in a watch’s metal for each stone to sit in. Patek Philippe describes it as the place where watchmaking and high jewellery meet. The method seen most often on watches is pavé, with holes cut straight into the case or dial.
What are the main types of gem setting?
In pavé setting, small beads of metal raised from the surface hold each stone in place. Claw setting works differently: curved metal prongs grip the stones instead. In grain setting, each diamond is held by tiny gold grains. They are shaped by hand and are hard to see. Invisible setting, also called mystery setting, goes further still. No metal can be seen holding the stones at all. The catch is that invisibly set stones cannot be taken out once they are in place.
What are snow setting and Flamme setting?
Snow setting was invented by Jaeger-LeCoultre for diamonds, and the brand uses it mainly on watches. Diamonds of different sizes sit side by side in a pattern that looks random. The aim is to leave as little metal as possible showing between the stones. Patek Philippe has its own technique, called Flamme setting. The company says it introduced Flamme setting in 2016 on the Calatrava Ref. 7200.
How precise does gem setting need to be?
Precision is critical in gem setting. Rolex is said to allow no more than two hundredths of a millimetre of variance in its gem setting. At Patek Philippe, every stone goes into its own guide hole. These guide holes are marked out in advance. So each stone has a place of its own, set out before it goes in.
Where it comes from
In French the craft is called sertissage. Its history goes back to 1810, when Breguet made a jewelled watch for the Queen of Naples. Invisible setting, also known as mystery setting, was first developed by Cartier and Van Cleef & Arpels in the 1930s. That was more than a century after the Breguet watch.
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