Stephanie Bohm Antiken Schmuck & Silber

Stephanie Bohm Antiken Schmuck & Silber is not a Zurich shop and does not pretend to be one. It is a family-run antique jewellery and silver business in Göttingen, a university town in central Germany, run entirely online and from one physical storefront. What earns it a place on a Zurich-focused list is what it says about its own customers: on its about page it names Austria and Switzerland specifically as places with "especially many satisfied customers," alongside international collectors it lists in London, Paris and Milan. For a newcomer to Zurich who wants a genuinely antique engagement ring and is comfortable buying at a fixed price without a plane ticket, that combination, real stock, worldwide shipping, and a customer base that already includes Swiss buyers, is worth knowing about.

The business is owned and run by Stephanie Bohm, a trained art historian, a qualified gemmologist and a diamond appraiser certified by the IHK, Germany's chamber of industry and commerce. She founded the shop in 2002, after more than 30 years working in the wider art trade. Her first exposure to the business came through her family's own antiques shop, S. Bohm Antiquitäten, which has been trading since 1947, though that shop deals in furniture rather than jewellery. She is also a member of the Honourable Society of Jewellery Historians, a credential that matters more here than in most retail listings, since this category is explicitly ranked on documentation rather than photography. An independent eBay listing for one of the shop's pieces confirms the same trading name and Göttingen address under "Stephanie Bohm e.K.," the German designation for a registered sole proprietorship, which is a useful second-source check that this is a real, ongoing business rather than a storefront with nobody behind it.

What you actually get

The catalogue runs across two main lines: antique jewellery and silver antiques, both organised into further subcategories on the site (rings, brooches, necklaces, earrings and cufflinks on the jewellery side; candlesticks, tea services and flatware on the silver side). The engagement ring section alone runs to dozens of individual pieces, each one a single, one-off item rather than a style you can reorder, spanning Jugendstil (German Art Nouveau), Art Deco, Victorian, Retro and later vintage work.

Prices on the engagement ring page run from 450 euros for a Victorian-style peridot and diamond ring in 18K gold up to 9,800 euros for a pink sapphire and diamond ring in white gold, set with a 2.97 ct unheated ("No Heat") sapphire and 0.9 ct of brilliants. In between sits real variety: a Jugendstil "Toi et Moi" ring from around 1910 with a 1 ct diamond in 14K gold and platinum at 2,900 euros, an Art Deco sapphire and diamond ring from around 1920 with a 1.0 ct old-cut diamond in 18K gold at 2,980 euros, and a solitaire mounted in 750 white gold (the German mark for 18-karat gold by fineness) with a natural 1.1 ct brilliant at 5,900 euros. That spread means a buyer working to a Zurich engagement-ring budget has options well below the four-figure mark and well above it, not just a handful of showpiece rings at the top.

The site states plainly that it uses only natural diamonds, not lab-grown or treated stones passed off as natural, and its item descriptions flag age marks or condition defects rather than photographing around them. The product photos are stated to be the actual item, not stock or reference images, which matters more for a vintage piece than a new one, since no two antique rings are identical and what you see is genuinely what ships.

Buying it from Zurich

This is the part of the site most relevant to an international buyer based here. Shipping is free worldwide via DHL, either DHL Paket or DHL ValuePack depending on the insured value of the item. For deliveries within the EU, the site states 1-2 business days after payment. Switzerland is outside the EU, and the shipping terms page addresses this directly rather than leaving it implied: for non-EU deliveries, the site asks for 3-5 business days of processing time, and states clearly that the buyer, not the seller, may owe additional customs duties, taxes or fees to the destination country's own authorities. It recommends checking with local customs before ordering. That is the right way for a dealer to handle this, since it puts the responsibility and the "ask before you buy" advice in writing rather than burying it in a shipping FAQ or leaving a Swiss buyer to find out at the border.

Payment options are bank transfer, PayPal, credit card, or cash if you collect in person at the Göttingen shop, which occupies a Renaissance-era building in the town's old quarter and is open to browse in person if you happen to be in that part of Germany. For anyone based in Zurich, the online shop is the practical route, and the free worldwide shipping means the sticker price on the ring page is close to what you will actually pay the seller, customs aside.

How it compares to Zurich's own vintage market

Set against Zurich's auction houses, the contrast is straightforward. Koller and Schuler run scheduled jewellery sales with viewing days, so a specific ring is available on their calendar rather than on demand, and the final price is whatever the room decides on the day. Stephanie Bohm sells the way a fixed-stock dealer sells: what's listed is available now, at the price shown, with no bidding involved. That suits a buyer who already knows roughly what era or stone they want and would rather buy it today than wait for the right lot to come up at auction. What it does not offer is a chance to view the piece in person before buying unless you are willing to travel to Göttingen, so anyone used to the old-town dealers' walk-in browsing will need to adjust to buying from photographs and a written description instead.

Who it suits, and the one thing to check

This shop suits an expat buyer who wants a genuinely antique or vintage ring, is comfortable with online buying from a real, named dealer rather than a marketplace, and does not need to inspect the piece in a shop window first. The credentials behind it, an IHK-certified appraiser running her own business since 2002 with family roots in the antiques trade since 1947, back up the kind of documentation this category is meant to reward.

One thing worth double-checking before you order: the about page states a 30-day right of withdrawal with a full refund, while the separate shipping and payment terms page states a four-week right of withdrawal. Those are close but not identical, and it is the kind of small inconsistency worth confirming directly with the shop before you buy rather than assuming either figure. Ring resizing is not mentioned anywhere on the site's FAQ or shipping pages either, so if a piece needs adjusting to fit, that is also worth raising with the shop before ordering rather than assuming it is included. Neither point is a reason to avoid the shop: they are exactly the kind of question a seller who publishes its terms in writing, on customs, on returns, on payment, invites you to ask before you commit, which is more transparency than several boutique dealers in this same category offer.