This is my first post and I hope the information below is useful even though it’s been some months since you asked.
I have a Garrard “classic court wedding band” purchased about 10 years ago. I contacted Garrard by email and subsequently placed the order over the phone and had the ring couriered to me from the main Albermarle Street store.
The presentation box is typical of the modern trend of presenting purchases in a company’s own livery.
Garrard uses 50 parts ruthenium in their 950 platinum alloy. This is 5% ruthenium by weight. Ruthenium has a lower specific gravity than platinum, which results in an alloy that is roughly 9% ruthenium by volume. (This is the same alloy that is used by Tiffany & Company.)
The
hallmarks on the inside of the shank are (left to right):
- G&Co (Garrard & Company – this is the maker’s mark. Garrard has used many different marks; click here for more information.)
- Orb (denoting platinum)
- 950 (denoting the purity of the platinum)
- Anchor (denoting that this item was assayed in Birmingham; items assayed in London have the Jaguar mark)
I later bought some sterling silver homeware – again via direct correspondence with the store. I have been very happy with my purchases although the items I bought are not items that I would necessarily need to send back to London should these ever need repair. Garrard exited the watch business some years ago and customers looking for repairs or appraisals (see recent Google reviews) have found the current staff unsurprisingly lacking in knowledge and also supposedly unhelpful. The company has also divested its electronics business.
Garrard Turntables, previously Garrard Engineering and Manufacturing Company, was sold off in 1960 and is currently owned by Cadence Audio. It no longer has any links to Garrard & Company.
My own experience of Garrard’s customer service and aftercare was excellent and I received hard copy catalogs in the mail each year until they rebranded as the “House of Garrard”. They appointed two new company directors at the end of 2016 and it feels like the reset button got hit at some point.
I note you had mentioned doing research into Garrard. I have two books that together cover most of the company’s history.
- The Story of Garrard's 1721-1911: Crown Jewellers and Goldsmiths during Six Reigns and in Three Centuries (Stanley Paul & Co, London, 1912)
- Garrard : The Crown Jewellers for 150 Years by Charlotte Gere and John Culme with William Summers (Quartet Books, 1993)
I have the original 1912 print of the first book and it’s got some eye-opening snippets on life in the early days of the company. In 1761, Garrard billed “To the Right Honble. The Lords Commissioners of His Majesty’s Treasury” the sum of £25,487/13/0 for services and loans of items for the coronation of King George III. Thanks to the internet, we can easily work out the inflation-adjusted figure. That's approximately £5.5 million in today's money.
If you are generally interested in brands with royal patronage, a few good ones to look into would be
Asprey,
Mappin & Webb (their master craftsman Mark Appleby is the current Crown Jeweller),
Bentley & Skinner and
Hamilton & Inches. All four companies hold Royal Warrants of Appointment. Asprey and Garrard were also formerly merged as a single company for a short period their histories.
The picture below is of the Hamilton & Inches Luckenbooth brooch I gave my wife to celebrate the birth of our son.
