THE FIRST EMERALD

Back in France, François Garaude studied architecture, philosophy and cinema. Through philosophy and cinema, he reflects on a new vision of the world, as if his trip to India had suddenly put everything back together and put everything back into play, as if he suddenly wanted to look at Western culture in through another prism. With architecture, he wants to understand everything about the organization of space and the main principles that govern it. He understands that light is the first material of architecture, which will not fail to inspire the jeweler that he is not yet, because on the jewel, it is the size and the arrangement of the stones that shape space and light. But again, the call of the sea torments him. At the same time as his studies, the young man built a 14-meter boat and embarked on a fantastic crossing of the Atlantic between France and Brazil. There, he meets the one who will be his wife. But the young Brazilian wants to continue her studies, so she will have to wait a few years there.

To keep busy while waiting to be able to return to Europe with her, François Garaude sets out to discover the emeralds of Bahia. And there everything changes. Fascinated by this exceptional stone, he quickly became a specialist in it. After having sold a first stone, then several, then a lot, the future jeweler gets caught up in the game of trading. He decides to make it his profession, traveling through the most beautiful mining regions of the world, Colombia, Sri Lanka, Burma, gradually discovering the value and the beauty of gems, learning to read a stone, to evaluate it. Moreover, is he not one of the first to have reintroduced jade, rich in a thousand virtues, in French fine jewelry?