Celebrating its 20th year of encouraging jewellers, students and apprentices in South Africa to design and manufacture statement jewellery pieces in platinum, 16 finalists have been selected in the two divisions of this year’s prestigious PlatAfrica competition.
Hosted annually by Anglo American Platinum in partnership with Metal Concentrators and Platinum Guild International (PGI) India, PlatAfrica is a market development initiative aimed at promoting innovation and technical expertise in platinum jewellery. While South Africa is by far the world’s largest producer of platinum, it only contributes a very small portion to global platinum jewellery production.
“PlatAfrica is one of our flagship initiatives to position platinum as the jewellery metal of choice. Over the years, our various efforts have contributed to establishing and growing platinum jewellery demand in China and India. Today, these are two key global platinum jewellery markets,” said Chris Griffith, CEO of Anglo American Platinum. “The competition has also allowed hundreds of South African jewellery designers over the years to gain experience working with platinum.”
The professional and student & apprentice categories were adjudicated by two separate panels of judges. The finalists were selected based on the quality and aesthetics of their design and manufacturing skills with the metal, which requires greater craftmanship than other precious metals like gold and silver.
“PlatAfrica offers a great opportunity for budding and professional jewellers in South Africa to work with platinum. For many students, it will be their first experience of working with the metal before they step into the professional world,” said Pallavi Sharma, head of strategic design and development at PGI’s India office, and convenor of the judging panels.
The theme for PlatAfrica 2019 is “Your love has gone platinum – celebrate the milestones in this journey of love”. Platinum has been symbolic of love due to its intrinsic qualities of being precious, eternal, pure and rare, and entrants were tasked with designing a statement piece for an urban customer of between 20 and 40 years of age, male/female, celebrating a milestone occasion.
This year’s finalists are:
Professional category:
Esther Boshoff & Team; Aimee Bredenkamp; Chris Janse van Rensburg; Mandlenkosi Moses None; Michelle Fang-Yu Liao; Nihal Shah & Thembi Maduna
Student/apprentice category:
Reply Baloyi; Kgomotso Mashego; Nomsa Mpinga; Mandisa Zinhle Nkabinde; Mfundo Nondyola; Jane Schoeman; Christina Toros; Joanne van den Berg; Anke van der Linden; Marinus Verster
For images of the finalists’ pieces, please visit
https://www.angloamericanplatinum.com/sustainability/platafrica/platafrica-2019.
The winners will be announced at an awards dinner on Wednesday, 23 October 2019 at the Inanda Club in Johannesburg. For further information, please contact: