This time of year offers one of the hardest transitions for many.
The holidays are over, and how quick we are to eliminate any evidence they happened at all: Christmas trees line the streets for trash pickup. Valentine’s Day items are already on the shelves (at least give us the courtesy of holiday clearance items!). The hustle and bustle from event-packed calendars and visiting friends and family has slowed, leaving in its wake a holiday hangover (and, for some of us, lingering colds that just.won’t.quit). Yes, that month of January can be a tough one once the dust settles—how accustomed we had become to the excitement of the season.
But a new year also offers hope, the resolve to do things better or differently, or whether to do them at all. Empty of December’s commotion, this new month offers a placidity ideal for refocusing our intentions on what we hope 2023 could be.
This sense of resilience and hope reads from the latest offering from Hawaiian jeweler Maui Divers, a pendant in collaboration with Greenland Ruby. A blooming lehua flower—lehua is the first tree to spring up from a recent lava flow—is outlined in fiery Greenland rubies, its elongated figure curling to rest inside an oval frame of diamonds.
The collaboration stems from a partnership struck up with Greenland Ruby at the JCK show in Las Vegas las June, Maui Divers’ creative director Hugo Laverde tells JCK, and evidence of its potential is clearly blooming (pardon the pun) here with this pendant’s debut, which officially drops on Jan. 6.
The ‘ōhi‘a lehua, Hawaii’s most common native tree, is home the vibrant lehua flowers, which represent passion, resilience, and everlasting love, qualities stemming from Hawaiian mythology and the story of ‘Ōhi‘a and Lehua, two young lovers separated by the jealous volcano goddess Pele.
As the story goes, Pele longs for the handsome ‘Ōhi‘a but he rejects her advances, his heart belonging to the lovely Lehua. In a fit of rage, the volcano goddess turns ‘Ōhi’a into a tree, separating him from the heartbroken Lehua. Depending on which version of the story you follow, other gods or a remorseful Pele herself attempt to reverse the curse to no avail, so they (or she) turn Lehua into a flower to be reunited with her true love once again.
A timeless tale told beautifully by a lovely, enduring (and also on trend—hello, Viva Magenta!) jewel, made in heavenly Honolulu. Something we can all get on board with for 2023.
Top: The ʻŌhiʻa Lehua pendant is a collaboration between Maui Divers and Greenland Ruby, is officially on sale Jan. 6.
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