This week, Dorsey is launching its fall collection, made up of earth-toned diamonds. (Which were, for a time, deemed ‘impossible’ to create in a lab. This is a misconception; colored lab-grown diamonds are produced by introducing the same trace elements and minerals that turn natural diamonds a certain color.) “It’s always interesting to hear, ‘Oh, I didn’t know you could do that’,” Strachan says.
It’s not just the colors and stone types Dorsey is expanding on. Strachan is getting more creative with the designs, too. At launch, Dorsey sold its simple Rivière necklace, a classic tennis necklace with a distinctive box clasp. Five-plus years in, Dorsey is in what the founder regards as the “best” factories — the ones that weren’t accessible at founding — which makes this innovation level-up possible, she says.
Now, Dorsey is expanding its offering of cuts and stones, Strachan says: the goal is to develop what she calls “true heritage design” that will be passed down through families, just as her grandmother, Dorsey (the brand’s namesake) did for her.
To date, this has meant more drops of more styles. Now, Dorsey releases about 20 collections a year. The product isn’t seasonal like fashion, but Strachan leans into seasonality with pops of color, leather and cord in summer, and more classic white and yellow gold in cooler months. This summer introduced colorful enamel and moissanite necklaces and anklets, as well as floating emeralds and ‘golden’ diamond necklaces. “It’s a great time to get out of our own zone — that’s what keeps us a current company.”
Now, as the weather cools, she’s getting back into what she calls Dorsey’s ‘archival pieces’: vintage-inspired wears made fresh with modern silhouettes — and materials. Today’s launch offers a glimpse of what’s to come: $7,750 3-inch drop diamond earrings in a bezel-and-prong setting; or a pair of $7,990 2.5-inch earrings, suspended from a huggie in an eight-prong setting.
Warm-toned, square huggie diamond earrings are available in a range of sizes, and a selection of seven different shapes of solitaire rings add to Dorsey’s small but growing collection of engagement-friendly rings, as lab-grown proposals continue to surge.
“My view on the next five to 10 years is that we’ll be able to redefine a category,” Strachan says. “That’s the plan: to reinvent a new way to build a heritage company.” She pauses. “Which, by the way, is probably doing it the old way — it’s not the way that we all thought we could in 2017 to 2023.”
Correction: The article was updated to reflect that Dorsey started with lab-grown sapphires, not diamonds as previously reported.
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