Thaíz Jewellery

Thaíz Jewellery is a one-person goldsmith studio run by Thaís Zaccarias out of Ottilienstrasse 19, in the 8003 postcode. That puts it in Kreis 3, the Wiedikon district, a former working-class quarter the city's own tourism office now describes as a popular residential and creative neighbourhood, well away from the Bahnhofstrasse jewellery row and the old-town lanes a newcomer might head to first. For an expat working out which name on a shopfront actually corresponds to a person, that matters: there is no showroom staff to ask for "the goldsmith", because Zaccarias is the goldsmith, the designer, and the person who answers the contact form.

Her own site tells a specific story rather than a generic one. She writes that she moved to Switzerland and worked in hospitality before jewellery, then saved enough to quit that job and go to Florence for a jewellery design course. That is the kind of detail that does not survive a name swap: it is a career change into the trade, made deliberately, rather than a family workshop passed down. Everything on the site after that point is framed as her own hand on the bench: "I design and handcraft every piece in my studio in Zürich, Switzerland," and the material list is specific too, solid 18k gold and 925 silver worked with what she calls carefully chosen gemstones, not a vague promise of "fine materials."

What a commission actually looks like

The custom process on Thaíz Jewellery runs in three stages, laid out the same way on both the general bespoke page and the wedding rings page. First, a conversation about what you have in mind, her own words are "a feeling, a stone, or a simple starting point," so you do not need a finished design to start. Second, she turns that into a design and refines it with you. Third, the piece is handmade in her studio. Getting into that pipeline costs a CHF 200 design deposit, which the site is upfront about: it covers the consultation and design work, it is non-refundable, and it is deducted from the final price if you go ahead and have the piece made. That is a real, published term, not a guess, and it is worth knowing before you email her, because it is the one number on the site that tells you what starting a conversation actually commits you to.

What is not published is a price for the finished ring itself. The wedding rings page says plainly that pricing depends on design and materials, with no price list attached, so anyone budgeting a Zürich engagement ring from an atelier like this should expect to get a figure only after the design conversation, not from browsing the site. What you can see priced are her ready-to-wear pieces in the online shop, rings, pendants, bracelets and necklaces that run from CHF 310 up to CHF 970, which at least gives a sense of where her silver and gold work sits before you get into a bespoke gold commission with diamonds or sapphires, both of which show up in her wedding ring gallery alongside tourmalines and amethysts.

She also states she takes on only a limited number of custom pieces each month, without publishing the actual cap, and her Instagram bio repeats the same idea in almost the same words, "limited monthly availability." For a couple used to larger ateliers with several benches running at once, that is worth planning around: a commission here is not a queue you jump by paying more, it is one maker's calendar.

Repairs and resizing, not just new work

This is also one of the few listings in this category where sizing and repair are handled through the exact same channel as a new commission, rather than being a separate service you would need to find elsewhere. The contact page frames its own form around two options: inquire about a custom piece, or inquire about repair services. If you already own a ring, an heirloom stone, or something that needs a new setting, that is the same 24-hour response promise she gives new commissioners. On sizing specifically, she sells a ring sizer tool you can order ahead of time or add at checkout, built around the Swiss Standard sizing chart, so a size gets confirmed before a ring is made rather than guessed at from a screen. Direct purchases from the shop come with complimentary ring sizing included, and if a piece arrives with a genuine fault, her shop policies commit to repairing it and sending it back free of charge, provided it is reported within 5 days of delivery. That is not a lifetime warranty and the site does not claim one, but it is a specific, published guarantee rather than an implied one.

Logistics that matter if you are not staying in Switzerland forever

An international buyer's real questions are about time and shipping, and Thaíz Jewellery answers both directly. Standard pieces are made within 2 to 4 days; anything built around a gemstone can take up to a month, which lines up with the extra sourcing that stone-setting work involves. Once a piece ships, domestic Swiss delivery through Swiss Post takes 1 to 2 working days, and international shipping takes 2 to 15 working days depending on destination. If you are ordering from abroad, or shipping a finished ring to family outside Switzerland, the policy page is clear that duties and taxes are not included and land on the buyer, which is exactly the kind of cost a newcomer to Zürich can get caught out by if nobody says it upfront. If you would rather skip courier risk altogether, there is an "Atelier Pick Up" option at checkout, collecting the piece straight from the workshop on Ottilienstrasse, which doubles as a reason to actually see the bench where your ring gets made.

The whole site runs in English by default, with a separate German version available from the same navigation, so a consultation conducted in English is clearly on the table rather than something you have to ask for and hope. There is nothing on the site claiming decades of heritage or generations of family ownership, which is honest: this is a newer, personal operation, not one of the multi-generation houses elsewhere in this category, and it reads that way deliberately.

How it sits against the other ateliers here

Compared with the larger, older neighbourhood workshops that show up elsewhere in this category, Thaíz Jewellery is smaller in every sense: one maker, one studio, a residential address rather than a shopping street, and a shop full of priced, ready-to-wear pieces sitting alongside the bespoke offer rather than a pure made-to-order operation. That combination suits a specific kind of buyer well: someone who wants to see actual finished work and real prices before committing to a design conversation, who is comfortable dealing with the person making the ring rather than a sales team, and who might also need an existing ring resized or repaired without opening a second relationship with a different jeweller. It suits less well anyone in a hurry for a finished custom piece in a fixed number of weeks, since no lead time is published for a full bespoke commission, only the production windows for items already in the shop.

The one real caveat worth naming is exactly the flip side of the personal setup: limited monthly capacity from a single maker means availability can run out, and if you need firm timing for a proposal date, that is worth raising with her directly, early, rather than assuming a slot. Set against that, a CHF 200 deposit that is clearly explained and gets credited back, a 24-hour response promise that appears consistently across three separate pages, and a repair and resizing option built into the same contact form as new commissions add up to a studio that is unusually transparent about what actually happens when you get in touch. For an expat buyer who wants a name they can reach directly, in English, with published terms rather than a sales pitch, Thaíz Jewellery earns its place in this category.