'The Taylor Swift effect? We've never experienced anything like it': Jeweller Cece Fein-Hughes' consuming passions

For Cece Fein-Hughes, what began in a bedroom in her parent’s house ended up on the fingers of Margot Robbie, Jacob Elordi and Taylor Swift. ‘We've never experienced anything like it,’ she recalls, of the bespoke order that came in last year for the pop superstar. Swift was introduced to Cece’s jewellery by the supermodel Gigi Hadid, who gifted the singer, and Kendall Jenner, bespoke pieces of jewellery. Swift’s tabby cat, Benjamin Button, was the centerpiece of a signet ring, surrounded by pearls, two brilliant cut diamonds, a flaming heart and a spear-pierced one with the number 87 inside — a reference to her fiance Travis Kelce's jersey number for the Kansas City Chiefs. For Robbie and Elordi, Cece Jewellery was chosen to commemorate the time they spent together filming Emerald Fennell’s new raunchy adaptation of Wuthering Heights. Robbie had matching signet rings made that feature a pair of skeletons embracing, with the words 'Whatever our souls are made of, his and mine are the same’ from the Emily Brontë novel. 'It was such a special request to create these matching rings [...] The skeletons are positioned exactly as they appear on the iconic film poster, entwined with roses and thorns, representing passion, beauty, and heartbreak,' Cece says.

The key to Cece Jewellery’s success may be that the business is a close-knit family affair. ‘My parents run their own construction company, and it’s really helpful to have guidance. My mum’s a designer, so she designs with me, and my dad leads the charge on the business,’ Cece says. In fact, case in point, as I am interviewing Cece in her west London office — ‘I’m a serious west Londoner. I can’t leave,’ she says — her mum pops in, as if on cue. She does this, Cece says, pretty much once a day.

Bubbly, warm and full of passion for her designs, time spent with Cece passes quickly, and with much laughter involved. Growing up, she didn’t imagine that she’d be a designer, but she was very much ‘a jewellery kid’. ‘I was like a little magpie. I'd get anything that was sparkling,’ she says. Her father was a deep sea diver — ‘he has all these old school tattoos, which is very much a theme that runs my designs’ — while her mother stayed at home. Cece has around eight small tattoos herself (she can’t remember exactly how many), of which one is a snake. Despite a genuine fear of the reptile, she is ‘obsessed with them’ and they feature a lot in her jewellery, though she’d ‘never be in a room with’ one. This kind of contradiction features a lot in her work — her seemingly girlish pieces tend to have a rather Gothic twist. For as many floral Cece Jewellery designs there are, they are an equally prevalent number that feature something more macabre. Many of her heart designs are bleeding, or pierced by an arrow. Plenty feature skeletons, perhaps reflecting Cece's own tattoo of a skull and crossbones: ‘It’s a good reminder that we’re all going to die,’ she says, with a light-hearted giggle.

She describes her upbringing as ‘hippie and wild’. ‘There were no rules. I actually asked my parents to have rules. I was like: ‘Dad, can you tell us to take our shoes off?’ Because my school friends did that.’ She grew up in Devon with an older brother and a younger sister. ‘It was all very whimsical and witchy. My mum and my granny went to Full Moon meetings. It was this very earthy upbringing. They were also creative and always encouraged me to draw and paint and walk on the moors and look at spider webs and stuff, so that sort of fueled my passion for creativity.’

Her business, despite ‘moving to London and bringing in a bit of the bling’ aims to capture the whimsy of her upbringing. Originally, she studied History of Art at university then completed internships at Christie’s and Sotheby's, before realising that she hated working at a desk. ‘I was itching to do something with my hands, so I did a short jewellery making course in Hatton Garden, completely randomly, and I discovered gold — and how magical it was.’

‘I didn't ever think I'd have a business,’ Cece says, candidly. ‘I didn't think I'd ever have a job. I was happy just to make a few little rings here and there. My deep passion is in design. When I design for a new collection, that's when I'm happiest.’

It is the enamel on her rings that makes them unique. Cece had studied the jewellery craft for a while before she came across enamel. ‘It was sort of — and I hate this term — a “eureka” moment, because it pulls in my love of history of art, which is paintings, but also my love of storytelling, and this kind of fairytale element you can wear.’

She has a particular love of the signet ring: ‘It’s brilliant because it's so British. It definitely has connotations of Eton, but I kind of love flipping that on its head a bit — wearing it on a different finger, stacking it up, painting crazy things on the signet ring. We've done paintings that are so un-proper, for lack of a better word.’ She describes her designs as ‘playful, fun and silly,’ complete with images that ‘makes you look twice’. Cece recently painted a bespoke ring where the customer had dreamt that they were a lion and had defeated an alligator in a battle to the death. ‘They said they needed it painted on a ring because it means something,’ she recalls.

‘Was this customer a man?’ I ask.

‘Yes,’ Cece says.

All this discussion of rings leads me to my most burning question for the married jewellery designer — the answer to which has, up until this point, been obscured by an inconsiderately clutched cup of tea. What kind of wedding ring does a ring designer wear? The answer is: more than one. She has three separate pieces on her ring finger. Dan, her husband, gifted her the first — her engagement ring — she made herself the second (‘because I really wanted more diamonds’) and the third is a simple wedding band. ‘I wanted something quite simple for us to exchange on the day, because I think there's something symbolic to that.’ Her husband wasn’t stressed when it came to choosing her engagement ring because he had been thoroughly briefed by Cece in the 10 years prior, she says. He also wanted to choose entirely by himself. She met him in the universal place where many great romances begin: on a dance floor while on a university night out.

The pair are a power duo: Dan also runs his own business in tech. ‘It's a really confusing world, and it's the complete opposite world that I work in,’ Cece says. He is not a natural jewellery wearer, but the designer won him around with a bespoke signet ring, featuring an illustration of a crane on one leg to symbolise balance. She was, he says, her ‘most difficult customer’. They share a ‘bossy and princess-y’ tabby cat called Lucky.

While there is plenty of joy at Cece Jewellery HQ, the increase in the price of gold recently has hit her business hard. ‘It’s really stressful. My finance team is not having a good time,’ she says. ‘We are going to increase our prices soon. We have to. It's crazy how much gold has gone up even in the last couple of months. It's really, really upsetting because it just suddenly cuts out a whole market of people for fine jewellery, but there's also nothing we can do because we are selling rings — we have to make a profit.’ So, would she ever switch to a different material? She bristles as that thought.

‘No. I can’t. I have to have the best of the best, because it would be doing enamel a disservice to use any lower carat gold or synthetic diamonds. It's such an ancient, beautiful craft that takes so many years of learning how to do it, and so few people in the world know how to do it. It's like treasured art, so we need to make sure it's on the best canvas.’

Your aesthetic hero

There’s this one scene in Baz Luhrmann’s Romeo + Juliet, and it’s where Claire Danes [Juliet] is looking through the fish tank, and the song ‘I’m Kissing You’ [by Des'ree] is playing. That’s my aesthetic hero. I think there's something so innocent and ethereal and magical about that scene and what she's wearing, but there's also an undertone of tragedy, which I love. I've been playing that scene over and over again for the last couple of months. I used that scene as my inspiration for our next collection.

A book you found inspiring

I wanted to say something really smart, but I’m actually going to say the truth. I was addicted to Romantasy for a whole year. I have almost a graveyard of Romantasy books in my house, and it’s got to be Fourth Wing [by Rebecca Yarros]. It’s not educational, but it is such delicious escapism, and I’m all about escapism and storytelling. I actually couldn’t talk to my husband for a whole weekend [because I was reading it].

The music you work to

I listen to really depressing music. I have to feel heartbroken and sad. And at the moment, it's classical, but kind of sad-classical. It ebbs and flows, I just have to transport myself back to Devon, and that's the way I do it. You have to light the candles, you need a nice, peaceful space.

An exhibition that has really impressed you

So I've obviously been to the Marie Antoinette one that's been huge, and the Cartier one [both recently at the V&A Museum], and I can’t decide between the two… I'd probably have to say Cartier, just because seeing the journey of Cartier from start to finish, and ending with the tiaras — it was just the most incredible old glamour, and it felt so inspiring.

What you’d take to a desert island

Obviously my husband and my cat, but mainly my mum, because I’m such a baby, and I think I’m getting more of a baby as I get older, really. I need my mum. I think I call her about five times a day and I see her every day, as long as she comes into the office (she lives around the corner). But yeah, I need my mum, always.

The last podcast you listened to

I’m actually not a podcast girl so, none. I don’t really commute so I don’t really have time to listen to podcasts — it’s a 10-minute walk.

The thing that gets you up in the morning

Lucky, my cat, and just a coffee in bed, I can’t do anything else until I’ve had that. I have black coffee, but the cup has to be three quarters full, and I take it with sugar.

The items you collect

I do have a collection of crystals, which is definitely a nod to my granny. I have one my brother gave me for something to do with health, because once I was really ill, and I feel like that's the sweetest thing ever, because he's a big rock-and-roll dude with a bald head and loads of tattoos. It was so sweet. I've also got one that me and Dan got in Sri Lanka. I've got crystals from all over the world. It’s a meaningful little shrine of crystals.

The last thing of note that you bought for yourself

I am making a plate wall at my house at the moment. I’ve bought these Astier De Villatte plates, which are extremely expensive and which you would never use as they’re so smashable — but they have paintings on them. One has a crow, another has a rose. It’s quite eccentric and it’s for my new kitchen. I’m really excited to put it all up, I just don’t know how.

A hotel you could go back and back to

Grand Hotel Son Net in Mallorca. We went last year and it’s one of those hotels where you don’t leave until you go to your returning flight, and because we both run our own businesses, sometimes we need a holiday where you literally don't do anything. It was actually heaven.

Your favourite painting

I feel like with this one, I thought about it, and it has to be this. I’m not trying to bring in all my jewellery collections, but it's just what I think about. It's The Garden of Earthly Delights by Hieronymus Bosch, because our last collection was inspired by that painting. Obviously it's a big triptych, and we created triptych pendants. I just love paintings where the closer you look, the more you discover. The allegory of, like: ‘Oh, that looks beautiful,’ and then you look closer, and it's like a skull or something dying.

The most memorable meal you've eaten

Le Vin Perdu, in Ashburton, Devon. We went over Christmas, and we were all amazed at how delicious it was. It's such a cute little glittery, candle-lit restaurant. We actually did our wedding drinks the night before there, and it was a set menu, and literally, every single plate was left empty. And it was great and we were all really happy. It was delicious Italian.

Who would play you in a film of your life

This is really hard. I actually can’t answer — you guys can. [The rest of us in the room agree she looks quite a lot like Dua Lipa, who has acted twice, a.) not very well, in the comedy film Argylle which is about a spy and a cat, and b.) slightly better in the film Barbie.]

The best present you’ve ever received

It’s a really obvious one, but when Dan proposed I literally screamed. I was so happy. It was a shocking surprise because I thought maybe it wasn’t going to happen. It was very much that time when everyone's maybe getting engaged, maybe not, and everyone’s a bit panicky and stressed.

A possession you'd never sell

A pendant that I made for my aunties, uncles and me. It's where we scattered my granny's ashes in Devon, we have this very special tor on Dartmoor — it's basically a hill with a pile of rocks on top — and it was almost like our family's pilgrimage. We'd go up it multiple times a year, and that's where we scattered her ashes and then laid down little pink blossoms. So I painted in enamel the little rock, a little pink blossom, and then it's got her initials on the back, which is very sweet. Because we don't have a tombstone, it's very untraditional. We didn't even have a funeral. So it's nice to have something that we have from that moment.

Find out more about Cece Jewellery on their website.