The Directory
Armenian Jewelers & Workshops
A heritage directory of the makers — workshops and manufacturers in Armenia, artisan masters, diaspora houses, and the institutions of the craft.
Who makes Armenian jewelry today? This directory documents the working landscape of the craft: the manufacturers of Yerevan, the silversmiths of Gyumri and Dilijan, the diaspora houses from Geneva to São Paulo, and the associations, foundations and schools that carry the tradition. It is a work of documentation, not a shopping guide — entries are compiled from public, verifiable sources (business registries, museum programs, cultural press) and describe each maker's craft identity, not its wares.
Workshops & manufacturers of Armenia
From Armenia's first jewelry plant to the contract workshops of modern Yerevan.
Davtyan Jewelry Company
Yerevan, Armenia · 2007
Gold and silver jewelry; enamel work
A small Yerevan workshop-manufacturer with its own showroom, registered as a producer of gold and silver jewelry with enamel and stone-set pieces.
JCA — Jewellery Company of Armenia
Yerevan, Armenia · 2001
Gold jewelry set with precious stones
A Yerevan jewelry factory working in gold set with precious stones — rings, earrings, necklaces, pendants, crosses, brooches and cufflinks — exporting since the early 2000s. The company dates itself to 2001; its legal registration followed in February 2002.
Pregomesh
Yerevan, Armenia · 2012
Sterling silver; traditional Armenian symbols and ornaments
A Yerevan brand-workshop founded in 2012 by the singer Sirusho, where a team of silversmiths hand-makes sterling-silver and 14K-gold pieces reinterpreting historical Armenian symbols, patterns and ornaments researched from traditional jewelry.
Prazyan Jewelry
Yerevan, Armenia · 2006
Contract (white-label) fine-jewelry manufacturing
A Yerevan contract manufacturer — operating, per the workshop, since 2006 — producing fine jewelry for outside brands, from 3D modeling and printing through hand-finishing and gem setting.
Yerevan Jewelry Plant (“Emil Grigorian” / Gnomon)
Yerevan, Armenia · 1950
Gold in 585/750/958; medals and commemorative coins; heritage collections
Armenia's first jewelry company, founded in 1950 as the Yerevan Jewelry Plant — later branded Gnomon, today trading as Emil Grigorian. It combines hand and machine production in 585, 750 and 958 gold with in-house diamond cutting; its heritage collections draw on Western Armenian church motifs and medieval bird-letter calligraphy, and its Soviet-era hallmark sequence, begun in 1953, still dates collector pieces.
Artisan masters & studios
Independent masters and small studios — Yerevan, Gyumri, Dilijan — including the hereditary lines of the Alexandropol school.
Aguletsi Jewelry (Astghik Samvelyan)
Yerevan, Armenia
Silver; ornaments from an ethnographic collection
A silver line established by Astghik Samvelyan in memory of her mother, the painter and ethnographer Lusik Aguletsi, at the family's house-museum: jewelry recreating traditional Armenian ornaments drawn from the museum's ethnographic collection.
Avetisian Jewelry
Yerevan, Armenia
Ethnic and contemporary silver; daghdighan amulets; enamel
A Yerevan workshop presenting itself as a two-generation family practice: ethnic and contemporary silver jewelry — including daghdighan, the traditional keepsake-amulet pieces — with enamel work.
Buduart Studio
Dilijan, Armenia · 2008
Copper-wire jewelry; designs from museum artifacts
A Dilijan studio run by Arman Badeyan and Margarita Malkhasyan since 2008, known for copper-wire jewelry and designs drawn from museum artifacts, documented through the Smithsonian's My Armenia program.
JEVO (Mamikon & Ashot Mikayelyan)
Gyumri, Armenia · 2011
Silversmithing; repoussé (chekanka); in-house alloys
A Gyumri silversmithing workshop founded by brothers trained at the city's arts academy: repoussé work, in-house alloying of silver, brass, copper and melchior, and settings in natural stone and wood — profiled by the Smithsonian's My Armenia program and Homo Faber.
KARA Silver Salon (Karine Avetisyan)
Yerevan, Armenia · 2008
Silver with enamel and mixed media; petroglyph and medieval motifs
Karine Avetisyan's Yerevan studio, working since 2008 in handcrafted silver with enamel and mixed media — leather, wood, brass, semi-precious stones — in motifs reaching back to petroglyphs and medieval Armenian ornament; Homo Faber describes pieces so detailed they read as sculpture.
Musheghyan Jewelry (Ruben Musheghyan)
Yerevan, Armenia · 1996
Handmade gold and silver jewelry
A Yerevan atelier founded in 1996 by the jeweler Ruben Musheghyan, styled an Honored Master of Armenia; its pieces are described as predominantly handmade. Work has been presented under the “Musheghyan Jewelry (MJ)” brand since 2000.
Tarakhchyan family of jewelers
Gyumri (Alexandropol), Armenia
Historic dynasty — gilded silver, engraving, medal carving
A four-generation dynasty of Alexandropol gold- and silversmiths working from the nineteenth century: gilded silver vessels, engraving, medal carving, tobacco boxes and pipe stems. The masters are gone; family pieces survive in museum collections.
Tsolak Koshtoyan
Gyumri, Armenia
Alexandropol-school silversmithing; mushurba vessels
A hereditary Gyumri master of the Alexandropol silversmithing school, working with inherited nineteenth-century molds and hand tools: silver belts, bracelets, and the mushurba — the “gurgling” drinking vessel — with work presented to visitors including the Pope.
Diaspora houses & ateliers
Houses founded by Armenians abroad — Geneva, London, Boston, Beirut, Istanbul, Moscow, São Paulo — carrying the craft across six generations of exile and exchange.
Ara Vartanian
São Paulo, Brazil · 2000
Stone-led design; inverted diamond settings
The house of Ara Vartanian — born in Beirut in 1975 into a family of jewelers, raised in São Paulo — designing since 2000: inverted diamonds set point-up, hook earrings, and multi-finger rings, with showrooms in São Paulo and a Mayfair, London flagship.
Barmakian Jewelers
Boston, United States · 1910
Diamond wholesaling and manufacturing; lost-wax casting
A multi-generation family firm in the Boston area, tracing to an arrival around 1910: diamond wholesaling and manufacturing with precision lost-wax casting and custom handcrafting.
Boghossian
Geneva, Switzerland · 1868
High jewellery; Art of Inlay; the Kissing setting
A six-generation family line of gem traders and jewelers begun in 1868 under Ovaness Boghossian, with roots in Mardin, passing through Aleppo, Beirut and Antwerp before settling in Geneva; the family launched its own maison in 2008. Its documented signatures are the Art of Inlay — one stone set within another — and the metal-free Kissing setting joining two gems.
Estet (Gevorkyan Jewellery Group)
Moscow, Russia · 1991
Full-cycle manufacture; hot and cold enamel; granulation
A Moscow jewelry house founded in 1991 by the Gevorkyan family: full-cycle manufacture in gold and silver with hot and cold enamel, chasing, granulation, engraving and blackening.
IceLink
Los Angeles, United States · 2003
Gem-set timepieces; diamond jewelry
A Los Angeles father-daughter family enterprise making gem-set timepieces — the 6Timezone collection is its most documented line — and diamond jewelry.
Sevan Bıçakçı
Istanbul, Turkey · 2002
Reverse intaglio carved inside gemstones
The Istanbul atelier of Sevan Bıçakçı, trained in the Grand Bazaar's master-apprentice tradition under Hovsep Çatak: reverse intaglio carved inside gemstones, domed rings depicting Istanbul, and Byzantine and Ottoman iconography.
Tateossian
London, United Kingdom · 1990
Men's cufflinks; kinetic mechanical designs
The London house of Robert Tateossian, founded in 1990 and documented chiefly for men's cufflinks — kinetic gear and tourbillon constructions in unconventional materials from meteorite to dinosaur bone — with an Armenia Heritage collection drawing on Armenian history and architecture.
Yeprem
Beirut, Lebanon · 1964
Avant-garde hand and body jewellery in diamonds
A family house founded in Beirut in 1964 by Yeprem Chakardemian; its second generation redirected the workshop toward sculptural hand and body jewellery in diamonds, of which the handpiece known as The Claw is the most documented example.
Institutions & education
The associations, foundations and schools that organize, document, and teach the craft.
Armenian Jewellers Association (AJA)
Global network · 1997
Pan-Armenian professional network of jewelers
The pan-Armenian professional network of jewelers, formed in 1997 — first meetings in Yerevan, formal launch in Basel: industry development in Armenia, the Yerevan Show trade exhibition, and young-designer showcases at GemGenève.
AJA East Coast (USA)
New York, United States · 1999
Regional chapter in the New York Diamond District
The association's East Coast chapter, based in New York's Diamond District since 1999: educational workshops, trade-show participation, exhibitions of Armenian jewelry craftsmanship, and community initiatives.
Armenian Jewellers Foundation (AJF)
Geneva, Switzerland · 2013
Research and documentation of Armenian jewellery heritage
A Geneva foundation researching and documenting the heritage of Armenian jewellery: a digital library of the art's history, publications and exhibitions such as Treasures of Western Armenia, and gemological scholarships — with documented activity through the late 2010s.
TUMO Studios
Yerevan, Armenia · 2017
Free craft-and-design education; jewelry atelier
A free craft-and-design education program in Yerevan with a jewelry atelier among its workshops, pairing local students with international designers to ground contemporary design in Armenian artisanal heritage.
About this directory
- Who is included in this directory?
- Makers and institutions of Armenian jewelry — workshops and manufacturers in Armenia, independent artisan masters, houses founded by Armenians in the diaspora, and the associations, foundations and schools of the craft. Every entry is verified against independent public sources before inclusion; resellers without a making identity are not listed.
- Is this a shopping guide?
- No. jewelry.am is an editorial publication and does not sell jewelry, rank makers, or give purchase advice. Entries describe each maker's documented craft identity — techniques, lineage, place — in alphabetical order, and inclusion is editorial and unpaid.
- How are entries verified?
- Each profile is compiled from at least two independent public sources — business registries, museum and heritage programs, cultural press — and every source is re-checked before publication. Details that could not be verified, such as an undocumented founding year, are left out rather than guessed.
This directory is necessarily incomplete: it lists makers whose work could be verified in public sources at the time of writing, and some notable workshops are absent where documentation was insufficient. It grows as verification allows — corrections and additions are welcome.