Diana Vincent
Encyclopedia
Diana Vincent is an American
jewelry designer
and businesswoman. Vincent is the niece of American fashion designer James Galanos
.
's Tyler School of Art
in Philadelphia to study metalsmithing and jewelry design. She studied at the school's Rome
campus for a year and graduated in 1980 with a bachelors degree in fine arts. Prior to her decision to take up a major in jewelry design, she dabbled in fabric design, pottery
, and graphic design
. Vincent and her husband, Vincent Polisano, opened Diana Vincent Inc. in 1984, originally operating out of her father’s garage. Her designs proved popular and her business grew quickly.
s, and gemstone
s. She incorporates platinum
, gold
, and silver
and uses diamond
s, pearl
s, Burmese rubies
, and sapphire
s from Kashmir
, Sri Lanka
, Thailand
, and Madagascar
. All parts of the jewelry-making process take place onsite at her workplace next to her studio, located in Washington Crossing, Pennsylvania
. Many of her jewelry fashions introduce sweeping curves and swirls, in symmetric flows with precious metals and stones.
In addition to original designs, Vincent also specializes in the creative redesign of jewelry, especially family heirlooms and sentimental pieces. One popular technique involves melting down the gold or precious metals of a piece of jewelry belonging to a family member to create custom wedding bands.
Vincent's jewelry has been displayed at the National Ornamental Metal Museum
and the Gemological Institute of America (GIA) Museum
. Vincent has received multiple awards for her work from De Beers
and industry trade groups, including two DeBeers Diamonds International Awards, and her designs have been worn by celebrity attendees of the Academy Awards
and the Vogue
VH1
Fashion Awards. In 2007, she appeared in the premiere of My Celebrity Wedding on the Style Network
.
include the 2003 design of the mule “Jewels," which was showcased first in front of the Philadelphia Museum of Art
for the Susan G. Komen Foundation Race for the Cure, then displayed at the James A. Michener Art Museum
for several months. In 2007, Vincent designed a pendant
for The Bucks County Women’s Fund, representing the mission of the organization, to be given to honorees as awards. Diana Vincent Jewelers also presented a major gift of $10,000 to St. Mary Medical Center's Primary Stroke Center.
Vincent is a co-founder of the International Jewelry Design Guild and a previous board member of the American Jewelry Design Council. She is also an advisory board member for the Bucks County Women’s Fund.
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
jewelry designer
Jewelry designer
A jewellery designer or jewelry designer is a person who renders original jewellery creations and usually constructs them as well...
and businesswoman. Vincent is the niece of American fashion designer James Galanos
James Galanos
James Galanos is an American fashion designer, widely considered to be one the world's foremost 20th century couturiers.-Early life:James Galanos was born September 20, 1924 in a Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, the only son of Greek-born parents...
.
Biography
In 1976, Vincent attended Temple UniversityTemple University
Temple University is a comprehensive public research university in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States. Originally founded in 1884 by Dr. Russell Conwell, Temple University is among the nation's largest providers of professional education and prepares the largest body of professional...
's Tyler School of Art
Tyler School of Art
The Stella Elkins Tyler School of Art, usually just referred to as Tyler School of Art is Temple University's school of art, which confers BFA and MFA degrees. The school was originally founded by sculptors Stella Elkins Tyler and Boris Blai on a separate 14-acre estate in Elkins Park...
in Philadelphia to study metalsmithing and jewelry design. She studied at the school's Rome
Rome
Rome is the capital of Italy and the country's largest and most populated city and comune, with over 2.7 million residents in . The city is located in the central-western portion of the Italian Peninsula, on the Tiber River within the Lazio region of Italy.Rome's history spans two and a half...
campus for a year and graduated in 1980 with a bachelors degree in fine arts. Prior to her decision to take up a major in jewelry design, she dabbled in fabric design, pottery
Pottery
Pottery is the material from which the potteryware is made, of which major types include earthenware, stoneware and porcelain. The place where such wares are made is also called a pottery . Pottery also refers to the art or craft of the potter or the manufacture of pottery...
, and graphic design
Graphic design
Graphic design is a creative process – most often involving a client and a designer and usually completed in conjunction with producers of form – undertaken in order to convey a specific message to a targeted audience...
. Vincent and her husband, Vincent Polisano, opened Diana Vincent Inc. in 1984, originally operating out of her father’s garage. Her designs proved popular and her business grew quickly.
Jewelry
Vincent’s designs feature a wide array of styles, precious metalPrecious metal
A precious metal is a rare, naturally occurring metallic chemical element of high economic value.Chemically, the precious metals are less reactive than most elements, have high lustre, are softer or more ductile, and have higher melting points than other metals...
s, and gemstone
Gemstone
A gemstone or gem is a piece of mineral, which, in cut and polished form, is used to make jewelry or other adornments...
s. She incorporates platinum
Platinum
Platinum is a chemical element with the chemical symbol Pt and an atomic number of 78. Its name is derived from the Spanish term platina del Pinto, which is literally translated into "little silver of the Pinto River." It is a dense, malleable, ductile, precious, gray-white transition metal...
, gold
Gold
Gold is a chemical element with the symbol Au and an atomic number of 79. Gold is a dense, soft, shiny, malleable and ductile metal. Pure gold has a bright yellow color and luster traditionally considered attractive, which it maintains without oxidizing in air or water. Chemically, gold is a...
, and silver
Silver
Silver is a metallic chemical element with the chemical symbol Ag and atomic number 47. A soft, white, lustrous transition metal, it has the highest electrical conductivity of any element and the highest thermal conductivity of any metal...
and uses diamond
Diamond
In mineralogy, diamond is an allotrope of carbon, where the carbon atoms are arranged in a variation of the face-centered cubic crystal structure called a diamond lattice. Diamond is less stable than graphite, but the conversion rate from diamond to graphite is negligible at ambient conditions...
s, pearl
Pearl
A pearl is a hard object produced within the soft tissue of a living shelled mollusk. Just like the shell of a mollusk, a pearl is made up of calcium carbonate in minute crystalline form, which has been deposited in concentric layers. The ideal pearl is perfectly round and smooth, but many other...
s, Burmese rubies
Ruby
A ruby is a pink to blood-red colored gemstone, a variety of the mineral corundum . The red color is caused mainly by the presence of the element chromium. Its name comes from ruber, Latin for red. Other varieties of gem-quality corundum are called sapphires...
, and sapphire
Sapphire
Sapphire is a gemstone variety of the mineral corundum, an aluminium oxide , when it is a color other than red or dark pink; in which case the gem would instead be called a ruby, considered to be a different gemstone. Trace amounts of other elements such as iron, titanium, or chromium can give...
s from Kashmir
Kashmir
Kashmir is the northwestern region of the Indian subcontinent. Until the mid-19th century, the term Kashmir geographically denoted only the valley between the Great Himalayas and the Pir Panjal mountain range...
, Sri Lanka
Sri Lanka
Sri Lanka, officially the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka is a country off the southern coast of the Indian subcontinent. Known until 1972 as Ceylon , Sri Lanka is an island surrounded by the Indian Ocean, the Gulf of Mannar and the Palk Strait, and lies in the vicinity of India and the...
, Thailand
Thailand
Thailand , officially the Kingdom of Thailand , formerly known as Siam , is a country located at the centre of the Indochina peninsula and Southeast Asia. It is bordered to the north by Burma and Laos, to the east by Laos and Cambodia, to the south by the Gulf of Thailand and Malaysia, and to the...
, and Madagascar
Madagascar
The Republic of Madagascar is an island country located in the Indian Ocean off the southeastern coast of Africa...
. All parts of the jewelry-making process take place onsite at her workplace next to her studio, located in Washington Crossing, Pennsylvania
Washington Crossing, Pennsylvania
Washington Crossing, Pennsylvania, is a small unincorporated village located in Upper Makefield Township, Bucks County, Pennsylvania, with a zip code of 18977. Formerly known as "Taylorsville," it is most famous for Washington's crossing of the Delaware River on Christmas of 1776 during the...
. Many of her jewelry fashions introduce sweeping curves and swirls, in symmetric flows with precious metals and stones.
In addition to original designs, Vincent also specializes in the creative redesign of jewelry, especially family heirlooms and sentimental pieces. One popular technique involves melting down the gold or precious metals of a piece of jewelry belonging to a family member to create custom wedding bands.
Vincent's jewelry has been displayed at the National Ornamental Metal Museum
National Ornamental Metal Museum
The National Ornamental Metal Museum is a museum in Memphis, Tennessee for the collection, preservation, and exhibition of historical and contemporary metalwork. The museum is housed in a 1930's brick building on a bluff overlooking the Mississippi River that was formerly used as a U.S...
and the Gemological Institute of America (GIA) Museum
Gemological Institute of America
The Gemological Institute of America, or GIA, is a nonprofit institute dedicated to research and education in the field of gemology and the jewelry arts. Founded in 1931, GIA's mission is to protect all buyers and sellers of gemstones by setting and maintaining the standards used to evaluate...
. Vincent has received multiple awards for her work from De Beers
De Beers
De Beers is a family of companies that dominate the diamond, diamond mining, diamond trading and industrial diamond manufacturing sectors. De Beers is active in every category of industrial diamond mining: open-pit, underground, large-scale alluvial, coastal and deep sea...
and industry trade groups, including two DeBeers Diamonds International Awards, and her designs have been worn by celebrity attendees of the Academy Awards
Academy Awards
An Academy Award, also known as an Oscar, is an accolade bestowed by the American Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences to recognize excellence of professionals in the film industry, including directors, actors, and writers...
and the Vogue
Vogue (magazine)
Vogue is a fashion and lifestyle magazine that is published monthly in 18 national and one regional edition by Condé Nast.-History:In 1892 Arthur Turnure founded Vogue as a weekly publication in the United States. When he died in 1909, Condé Montrose Nast picked up the magazine and slowly began...
VH1
VH1
VH1 or Vh1 is an American cable television network based in New York City. Launched on January 1, 1985 in the old space of Turner Broadcasting's short-lived Cable Music Channel, the original purpose of the channel was to build on the success of MTV by playing music videos, but targeting a slightly...
Fashion Awards. In 2007, she appeared in the premiere of My Celebrity Wedding on the Style Network
Style Network
The Style Network is an American cable television network based in Los Angeles.Owned by NBCUniversal, a subsidiary of General Electric and Comcast, its sister channels include E! Entertainment Television, USA Network, Syfy, G4, Golf Channel, and Versus, among others.-Network Overview:Style's...
.
Philanthropy & professional involvement
The designer's philanthropic effortsPhilanthropy
Philanthropy etymologically means "the love of humanity"—love in the sense of caring for, nourishing, developing, or enhancing; humanity in the sense of "what it is to be human," or "human potential." In modern practical terms, it is "private initiatives for public good, focusing on quality of...
include the 2003 design of the mule “Jewels," which was showcased first in front of the Philadelphia Museum of Art
Philadelphia Museum of Art
The Philadelphia Museum of Art is among the largest art museums in the United States. It is located at the west end of the Benjamin Franklin Parkway in Philadelphia's Fairmount Park. The Museum was established in 1876 in conjunction with the Centennial Exposition of the same year...
for the Susan G. Komen Foundation Race for the Cure, then displayed at the James A. Michener Art Museum
James A. Michener Art Museum
The James A. Michener Art Museum is a private, non-profit museum in Doylestown, Bucks County, Pennsylvania founded in 1988 and named for the Pulitzer Prize–winning writer James A. Michener, a Doylestown resident...
for several months. In 2007, Vincent designed a pendant
Pendant
A pendant is a loose-hanging piece of jewellery, generally attached by a small loop to a necklace, when the ensemble may be known as a "pendant necklace". A pendant earring is an earring with a piece hanging down. In modern French "pendant" is the gerund form of “hanging”...
for The Bucks County Women’s Fund, representing the mission of the organization, to be given to honorees as awards. Diana Vincent Jewelers also presented a major gift of $10,000 to St. Mary Medical Center's Primary Stroke Center.
Vincent is a co-founder of the International Jewelry Design Guild and a previous board member of the American Jewelry Design Council. She is also an advisory board member for the Bucks County Women’s Fund.
Professional affiliations
- American Jewelry Design Council
- Society of North American GoldsmithsSociety of North American GoldsmithsThe Society of North American Goldsmiths was founded in 1969. It is an international nonprofit organization that serves as the primary organization of jewelers and metal artists in North America. Anyone interested in the related fields may become a member...
- American Gem SocietyAmerican Gem SocietyThe American Gem Society is a trade association of retail jewelers, independent appraisers, suppliers, and selective industry members, which was founded in 1934 by Robert M. Shipley, who also founded the...
- Jewelers of America