The business was founded in 1860 by Josiah Hancock, initially offering a clock-winding service during the city’s cotton boom. It later moved from its first Piccadilly location to King Street, where it has remained for more than a century.

Owner Roy Lunt said: “Jewellery styles may evolve, but our commitment to quality, service and beauty never changes. Celebrating 165 years of heritage in Manchester is a moment of immense pride for the entire team.”

Hancocks has sold hand-selected diamonds, coloured gemstones and bespoke jewellery to generations of customers in Greater Manchester and beyond.

Its collection reflects changing design eras, from 1950s gem-set pieces to 1970s abstraction and today’s focus on high-quality stones such as emeralds, rubies and sapphires.

The company is recognised as a specialist in diamonds and precious stones, serving clients across the UK and overseas.

The new retail space offers clients an opportunity to view its core jewellery and watch collections, as well as selected high jewellery and egg objets.

The first Fabergé London boutique opened in 1906 at 48 Dover Street, later moving to 173 Bond Street in 1910.

These stores were a “renowned destination” visited by royalty, nobility, socialites and connoisseurs from around the world.

Just a stone’s throw from Piccadilly Arcade, Fabergé stated that bringing the new store to London is a full circle moment.

The boutique is now open for walk-ins and private appointments.

Antony Lindsay, CEO of Fabergé, said: “We are delighted to open our doors again in the beautiful Piccadilly Arcade. We’re looking forward to welcoming everyone to our new boutique to discover our latest collections and to meet our wonderful team.”

Jewellery designer Lily Gabriella will launch her first ever showroom within the Penthouse above the Piccadilly entrance, opening in November; 886 Jewellery – The Royal Mint will be opening their first jewellery boutique and CARA Jewellers their first boutique in Europe adding to their current 14 stores in Dubai.

The 37,000 sqft arcade, with a combined frontage of over 1,100 feet, runs along a 196 yard arcade from Piccadilly through to Burlington Gardens.

These new openings join an existing selection including N.Peal, Manolo Blahnik, Strathberry, Vilebrequin, Kick Game, Laduree, Lalique, Globe Trotter, The Vintage Watch Company, E.Marinella, OMEGA Vintage Boutique, Bell and Ross, Crockett and Jones, and many more.

The new Lily Gabriella showroom takes the pPenthouse position in the Burlington Arcade, overlooking Piccadilly. The two-floor 450 sq.m showroom, has been designed by Lily Gabriella and her vision realised by Mark Alexander Woolnough.

To mark the opening of the showroom Lily has created seven new pieces to add to her Collectors Editions. Conceived as a “constantly evolving offering of one-of-a-kind pieces”, ‘Collectors Editions’, sees individual heirloom jewels combined with technically challenging and complex craftsmanship.

The new pieces include the Tourmaline Deco Ring in rose gold, set with a 3.36ct pink tourmaline, diamonds and hand carved lapis lazuli and the Trilogy Ring in rose gold, diamonds, lapis lazuli and pink sapphire, both these rings showcase Lily Gabriella’s brand colours that are also the colour scheme of the showroom.

Other pieces include the Lunar Earrings in white gold, with South Sea and Tahitian pearls, black and white diamonds, the Amethyst Optic Earrings in rose gold, amethyst and purple enamel, the Diamond Nova Earrings in white and rose gold and diamond, the Posy Earrings in rose gold, a 5.12ct pair of aquamarines, pink sapphires and diamonds and the Flora Earrings in rose gold, a 10.92ct pair of morganites and over 5cts of diamonds.

It comes as Supernaturae will be producing a series of rotating events around nature, beauty, and design, including workshops..

Supernaturae features work produced in rural villages where “craftwork is often the only local source of income”. The pop-up at 12 Piccadilly Arcade will showcase the brand’sThey are bringing to London their collaborations with artisans from Mexico and India.

The pop-up installation is designed by artist Andy James, after the company was granted the opportunity by Westminster City Council.

Vashi has announced that its newest flagship store will open on the corner of Old Bond Street and Piccadilly in spring 2022.

The store provides 4,500 square feet of space and it will offer customers fine jewellery as well as Vashi’s signature workshop, inviting customers to become part of the jewellery making process.

Customers can watch casting in-house, where 100% recycled precious metal is melted in furnaces that reach almost 2,000 degrees celsius, and work with the brand’s designers to create pieces with 3D modelling.

Vashi said the new store is the “first brand in the world” to bring casting in-store, welcoming customers into the design and making process.

Additionally, jewellery can also be made with engravings, and customers can see these appear in real time in the laser lab.

Meanwhile, as with the brand’s Covent Garden flagship, this new space has been reimagined in partnership with New York-based creative studio Mythology, whose clients include Peloton, Tesla, Google and Warby Parker.

Vashi Dominguez, founder, chairman and CEO, said: “This year has been enormous for Vashi, and I am thrilled to announce the opening of our newest flagship in 2022. 

“We are creating a space on Old Bond Street where our customers can come in and instantly feel relaxed – whether they want to see diamonds up close or just have a drink at the bar. And I can’t wait to welcome them.”

They are also rich in iron, nickel, and valuable platinum-group metals such as platinum and iridium – and of course diamonds. Every year something like 200 tonnes of platinum is extracted from the Earth’s surface — to the tune of about $6bn (£4.6bn). But according to some estimates, the value of these platinum- group metals in all of the asteroids “close” to the Earth is valued at $700trn (£541trn).

There is one particular mile-wide rock named 3554 Amun that is alone thought to contain $20trn (£15.7trn) worth of valuable metals and diamonds. And unlike on Earth, these precious materials are not buried under the surface, they are practically lying on top, waiting to be extracted.

So it is perhaps not surprising that so many companies are scrambling to get up there. A further motivating factor is Goldman Sachs’ claim that the fortune of the first individual trillionaire is to be made in asteroid mining.

Mining beyond earth — Projects in the works 

Today there are both private and government- sponsored attempts to capture the resources of near-Earth asteroids. And indeed there have already been successful landings on asteroids such as the missions completed by NASA’s Osiris- Rex and Japan’s Aerospace Exploration Agency’s Hayabusa2 in 2018. More recent developments include NASA’s ‘Innovative Advanced Concepts’ programme — that goes by the acronym NIAC — which is entering the third phase of its existence.

This is the moment when its scientists will begin working on aerospace architecture, mission concept designs, and more to help with the rapid surveying and modelling of celestial bodies for raw materials (among other things). This particular project within a project is known as project Skylight. In addition to Skylight, NASA is also working on the complimentary Mini Bee, which aims to locate the resources, extract and then deliver them home. NASA’s scheming aside, private ventures are probably more numerous than you might imagine. Enough for journalists to excitedly dub asteroid- mining as a new space race.

Notable companies include Japan’s ispace, US-based Planetary Resources and OffWorld, and the UK’s Asteroid Mining Corporation. The latter company is launching Project El Dorado — named after the fabled lost city of untold riches in Spanish colonial America — in 2023.

Investing in diamon extraction from space

Asteroid-mining as an idea still half lies in the realm of science fiction. So of course investing in diamond extractions from space will be financially risky. According to the journalist Gordon Dillon, writing about asteroid mining in his book Fire In The Sky, asteroid mining today is a little like the internet in 1986.  As he put it, “for  people willing to take the risk, it could be the equivalent of buying Amazon stock at eighteen bucks a share”. There are also opaque laws in place.

Laws that may well soon be overturned, but were written at a time before asteroid-mining was even thought possible. For example the Outer Space Treaty of 1967 specifically states that no nation can own an outer-space object, such as an asteroid. International law has almost nothing to say on the private exploitation of them. Although some attempt was made to pave the way for American private expeditions with the Spurring Private Aerospace Competitiveness and Entrepreneurship (SPACE) Act of 2015 for asteroid mining, as long as no biological life was on the asteroids themselves. Right now it still isn’t economically viable or technologically feasible to mine and therefore invest in diamonds from space.

Although it is thought we will be at that viable and feasible point almost tomorrow. Some overly optimistic, pre- coronavirus targets included 2020 in their calculations. But it will be more like another decade from now before we start seeing real progress. Yes, some companies are boldly declaring mission dates like 2023, but we shall see. So in short, if the Internet looked like a good prospect in the 80s to some, then so should outer-space diamond mining today. That there are untold riches out there is not in doubt, but they are millions of miles away and travelling through the solar system at colossal speeds.

Although that needn’t really be much of an obstacle. It has already been done. As anyone who followed the activities of the Rosetta spacecraft knows, in 2015, after a 10 year flight, the European Space Agency successfully, after travelling 6.5 billion kilometres, dropped a lander on to a comet.

Concerns, opportunities and the future of asteroid minning 

But there are concerns. Some people have said that diamond extraction in this way could destroy the economy here on Earth. Obviously if you were to bring too much back from an asteroid the market price would collapse. It would be something akin to De Beers finding a million-ton diamond in South Africa, cutting it up and putting all of the pieces on to the market at once.

Suddenly a diamond would be worthless, and jewellery stores would be displaying ever-more engagement rings encrusted with sapphire or emeralds to their customers instead. But this problem could be avoided by dishing out the space-extracted diamonds in small, non-market collapsing quantities.

Actually, this is what De Beers does today – and is almost certainly what will happen. Yet at the same time, romanticising the process of extraction, and detailing the nature of how the diamond was extracted, could help to retain value even in the case of oversaturation — and make the diamonds more valuable in that regard. After all, they might both be diamonds.

But which would be more appealing — one mined from Earth or the other from outer space? The same logic of thinking is why many guitarists pay more for California-made Fender guitars over Mexican-manufactured ones. No matter what happens, this is an exciting time. And my bet is it will be the start of a great new age for luxury diamonds and their customers.

Byline by Mark Kaufmann of Watch Repair Piccadilly

Established in 1786 and based at Regent Place, Birmingham, Deakin & Francis designs and manufactures cufflinks, jewellery and luxury accessories. It is currently managed by brothers Henry and James Deakin, the seventh generation of the family.

A new sales team has been hired to manage the store and the business also plans to employ a new craftsman to meet growing demand for products.

Henry Deakin, managing director, said: “We are immensely proud to have recently opened our first flagship store, it’s taken 230 years to get to this point. Our brand is going from strength to strength and we are incredibly grateful that our customer base is growing every day all over the world, so there really couldn’t be a better time for us to open a store.

The firm said it will offer a “mix of luxury, sophistication and of course, some unexpected D&F twists”.

“It also allows us to offer a stylish, central venue for customers – both consumer and trade – to come and meet with us. There is even a unique gin bar upstairs, it wouldn’t be a Deakin & Francis shop without a good tipple,” he added.

Based at the Piccadilly Arcade in London the store will be filled with a range of cufflinks, jewellery and luxury accessories.

Brothers Henry and James Deakin are the seventh generation to manage the brand, and as the next step the boutique store will aim to convey the firm’s heritage and craftsmanship through a carefully designed interior offering a luxurious setting for customers.

Henry Deakin, managing director, said: “We are immensely proud to be opening our first flagship store – it’s taken 230 years to get to this point. Our brand is going from strength to strength and we are incredibly grateful that our customer base is growing every day all over the world, so there really couldn’t be a better time for us to open a store.

“We want to make visiting our store an unforgettable, welcoming experience, offering a mix of luxury, sophistication and of course, some unexpected twists.”

He added: “There are even plans to have a unique gin bar upstairs – it wouldn’t be a Deakin
& Francis shop without a good tipple!”

The new collection will be showcased at the Buckley London stand, featuring elegant curves, feather motifs and leaf shaped settings which is said to add an element of nature inspired beauty whilst the jagged baguette stones and colourful tassel bracelets bring a touch of fun.

With the continuing trend for personalised jewellery, Buckley London will launch a new collection of zodiac bracelets.

The Astro collection includes twelve bracelet designs containing a birthstone to represent each month, and an engraved star constellation of the corresponding zodiac sign on the reverse.

Having become renowned for their hugely popular three for two fashion bracelets selection, Buckley London will add three new designs to this range for the new season; Bloomsbury, Pimlico and Covent Garden.

Following the response when the Piccadilly bracelet collection was launched on airlines earlier in 2017, Buckley London have also made its other bestselling bracelet designs such as Portobello and Soho available to inflight customers for the very first time.

Additionally, Buckley London will launch a range of exciting new inflight exclusive gift sets, including travel inspired compass designs and new interchangeable pendants and earrings.

Amy Donlon, head of sales for Buckley London, said: “TFWA Cannes is a fantastic opportunity to meet with our many existing customers and also to showcase our latest product range to a host of prospective buyers on a global scale.

“Last year’s show saw a record high in new meetings at the Buckley London stand, with many visitors drawn in by the visual impact of both our products and display equipment. We believe that the new collections will excite and inspire buyers and we look forward to creating a real buzz around the stand.”