Casellini Design

Casellini Design is a one-person jewellery atelier in Bülach's old town, a different world from the boutiques on Bahnhofstrasse even though it still sits within the wider Zürich area this list covers. Elena Casellini runs it herself: she designs every piece, casts and finishes most of them by hand, and answers her own phone. There's no showroom staff to greet you and no sales floor to browse. The site says plainly that visits happen "meistens im Showroom, dennoch bitte Termine nach Vereinbarung," which is a polite way of saying call first. That one-person model is exactly what defines this corner of the Glattal and Unterland list: an appointment-only atelier working from something close to a home studio, rather than a shop-in-shop counter inside a bigger mall.

Her training runs deeper than a hobbyist turned online seller. She studied at the Kunstschule Benvenuto Cellini in Valenza, a Piedmont town associated with Italian goldsmithing, where she learned the trade formally rather than picking it up informally. Her first venture afterward wasn't rings at all: she made personalised silver keychains for sports clubs and companies around Ticino, then founded a company called KEEEART AG, which still trades today as a gift and accessories business based in Luzern. CASELLINI design, the atelier listed here, came later. She set it up in her own private atelier in 2008, and a LinkedIn profile under her name puts her career at over 18 years as a jewellery designer and business owner, a figure that lines up with a 2008 start.

What she makes spans more than rings. The site's own categories run to necklaces, pendants, bracelets, earrings, a line she calls Candle Pin, and keychains, alongside the rings. Two production methods come up repeatedly in her own description of the work: wax casting, which she uses for complex patterns, braided textures and fine detail, and direct metalworking, where the metal is heated, bent and hammered by hand into shape. Materials are mostly sterling silver, marked 925 throughout the shop, and bronze, with cubic zirconia, brass and freshwater pearl turning up on individual pieces. She states that her metals come from suppliers belonging to the Responsible Jewellery Council, an actual sourcing standard rather than a vague sustainability line.

How it's organised

The atelier sits at Rössligasse 6 in Bülach, and that's where appointments happen. Beyond it, Casellini's work also sells through two Concept Store arrangements: one at Kirchgasse 17 in Meilen, on the Gold Coast side of Lake Zürich, and a newer one inside the Kaiserhaus in Bern, which her Instagram account shows opening recently. The online shop carries the current catalogue directly, with pricing shown down to the franc. A look through the ring section alone turns up pieces from CHF 169 (a bronze ring called Luna) up to CHF 469 (Caramelle, in silver with 5 coloured cubic zirconia stones, currently sold out). Several designs sit in a reduced-price bracket: a silver-and-bronze Rondó Antico set with cubic zirconia is CHF 399, down from CHF 499, and a Double Diamond ring is CHF 210, down from CHF 260. Ring sizes on the listed pieces mostly run from 53 to 56, standard European sizing rather than anything bridal-specific, and a few models are offered made to custom size on request. Shipping within Switzerland through the online shop is a flat CHF 10; the site notes that international orders can add customs duties and fees on top of the shown price, without publishing what those add up to.

That last point matters if you've come to this list for an engagement ring specifically. Nothing on the site separates bridal rings from the rest of the catalogue, and we couldn't find the word Verlobungsring, or an English equivalent, anywhere on it. What the homepage does say is that a piece can be made "als Unikat," as a one-of-a-kind commission, on request. In practice, the honest way to shop here for an engagement ring is to call or email and ask directly whether a design you like, or one you describe, can be built as one. Casellini answers her own calls and already makes custom, numbered one-off pieces: two of the current ring designs are titled Unione 1 and Unione 2, each described on the site as a numbered unique piece. That makes it a real conversation to have, not just a hopeful one.

How it compares

Set against the bigger names on Bahnhofstrasse, this is a different kind of purchase: no in-house diamond grading, no multi-generation brand history, nothing built for international walk-in clients. Set against the other appointment-only ateliers in this same Glattal and Unterland tier, Casellini has more of a public paper trail than most: a named art school, a named prior company that's still findable and trading, a public price list, and an active social account showing recent work. That's worth something when the usual alternative is a single page with no history behind it at all.

Who it suits

This suits an expat buyer who already has enough German for that phone or email conversation, or who's happy to write in English and see how the reply comes back, since we found no English-language option on the site itself. It suits someone who wants a piece genuinely made by the person they're emailing, rather than a house collection with a name on the window, and who's comfortable with a process that publishes no price list, no lead time and no minimum order for custom commissions. If what you need is a ring pulled from a bridal collection with next-day sizing and a returns desk, this isn't that. If you want a one-of-a-kind piece built around an actual conversation with the designer, it's a genuine option worth that call.

The verdict

Casellini Design earns its place on a practical strength: a real, traceable goldsmith with formal training, a second business (KEEEART AG) that's still around, and now three points of contact, across Bülach, Meilen and Bern, rather than one static page. The one real caveat is that engagement rings aren't a labelled category here, so a buyer has to ask rather than browse, and the site gives no English option for doing that asking. Neither is a reason to skip it. Both are reasons to call ahead, say exactly what you're after, and let Elena Casellini tell you what a custom piece would involve before you commit to anything.