Gem of a jeweller cuts out the blood diamond industry

Oct 29 2009 by George Topp, Lanark & Carluke

A LESMAHAGOW woman who creates beautiful jewellery with a conscience has been shortlisted for a top award.

Vivien Johnston (32), has been short-listed from hundreds of entries for the ‘Ultimate Green Queen’ category at The Cosmopolitan Ultimate Women of the Year Awards 2009

Vivien speaks up to save the lives, and livelihoods, of those blighted by the blood diamond industry.

She gave up her job as head of design for a large British jewellery company when she realised she was part of an industry using gold and gemstones hewn from the ground and polished by children.

“I remember talking to one would-be supplier who was being so blasé about it and I was really shocked.

“I couldn’t believe he could be so open about it.”

She tried to set up a corporate social responsibility programme within the company, but tracing the supply chain of a large company was just too difficult.

“The more I thought about it, the less I liked it and the more uncomfortable I felt about the industry I was in,” she said.

So in 2006 Vivien applied for a small grant from Women In Business and Scottish Enterprise. She designed, made and packaged her first collection of 50 beautiful pieces and started her own business in Glasgow.

She has had to fight resistance within the jewellery trade but is now running a successful company using only gold and gems sourced from fair trading and co-operative mines with eco sustainability. The stones are cut and polished in workshops that don’t use child labour.

She also donates a percentage of her profits from her Little Acorn pendant to children in Uganda orphaned by HIV, and she has campaigned for policy change by addressing the industry’s top bosses at companies including Cartier, Tiffany and De Beers.

She works 11-hour days and turns over around £250,000 a year. Next year she will marry her conservationist fiancé, Edward, and move to Kent, and hopes to open a second shop in London.

“I want to use my skills as a designer to instil a sense of beauty and respect for the precious materials and the people who make their lives from them,” Vivien added.

The Cosmopolitan Ultimate Women of the Year Awards will be held on November 11 at the Banqueting House, Whitehall, London. The judging panel includes Sarah Brown, Fearne Cotton, Vernon Kay, Alesha Dixon and editor Louise Court. Š