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Ambaji Shinde, jeweller to world's rich, passes away
Tuesday, 15 April 2003, 19:30 IST
NEW YORK: Indian American Ambaji Shinde has died at the age of 85 after serving for 40 years as principal designer at the fabled New York jewellery house of Harry Winston.
The cause of his death was complications following a hip fracture, compounded by diabetes and pneumonia, his son Shyam told IANS.
During his career at Harry Winston, he had a hand in the creation of some of the 20th century's headline pieces of jewellery, including the $40 million "American Rainbow Tiara", which was placed on the brow of American beauty Brooke Shields.
Shinde's story is mostly that of the fabulously expensive gems, costly in money, blood and tears that passed through the house of Harry Winston.
For example, he was the designer of "Blue Hope", a 45.52 carat dark-blue stone, one of the world's most famous diamonds, believed to have been stolen from a Shiv idol in southern India in the 17th century -- the desecration is supposed to have brought bad luck to all its subsequent owners, including the Sun King of the French Louis XIV, who died of smallpox, and Louis XVI, Marie Antoinette, and Countess Du Barry, who died on the guillotine.
The French house of Cartiers sold it to the Macleans in 1910. After the last of the Macleans died, Harry Winston bought it as part of a lot of 74 gems for over $1 million, reset it, and after a national tour, very wisely gifted it to the Smithsonian.
Not surprisingly perhaps for a man whose working hours were devoted to dreaming up perfect symbols of worldly beauty, and pride, Shinde preferred to keep his life simple.
Till afflictions of age, including arthritis, made it difficult for him to do so, he took the bus from his home in Flushing to Manhattan. For the last two years, the company had a limousine bring him to work and take him home.
"He preferred the bus because the ride helped him to think," Shyam Shinde said.
Shyam, who is an engineer with the semi-conductor industry, said his father didn't even have a computer in his apartment. He was not on e-mail.
He lived on Kissena Boulevard in Queens, not far from the Hindu Temple. He lived mostly alone, though visited often by his two sons living in the U.S. -- Shyam, 60, and Dilip, 54.
Born in Goa, the son of a bangle maker, Ambaji Shinde trained for the fine arts at the J.J. School of Art in Mumbai, but moved to his father's trade after graduation.
Employed by Nanubhai Jewellers in the Mumbai of the years before World War II, he honed his skills, designing pins and brooches, necklaces and bracelets for erstwhile royals and the nobility.
After India's independence, with ascetic Gandhian values on the ascendance, and little scope for the flowering of his talents, he moved to New York at the invitation of Harry Winston.
His wife, Manorama, however, stayed back, unwilling to cross the black waters not because of the poor state of her health, as implied in an obituary, otherwise beautifully written, in the New York Times, but because she didn't want to be far from her in-laws, nor to uproot her six children, and their growing families, said Shyam.
Manorama died two years ago at the age of 74.
Ambaji Shinde, on the other side of the waters, lived a Spartan life. "He really loved his work," said Shyam. "He rose from the bed really enthused about going to work at Harry Winston's."
He also loved Indian classical music and played the tabla, ostensibly to loosen his arthritic fingers.
All the same, his overwhelming love was designing jewels to bring out the brilliance and romance of stones. His name may be added to the list of the maharajas and monarchs on whom the wickedly beautiful stones had cast their spell.
Source: IANS
Source: IANS
