Every year at around this time in September London’s Earls Court hosts ‘IJL’, or International Jewellery London.

IJL is the trade show for the UK’s jewellery trade, attracting exhibitors such as jewellery designers who wish to sell their new collection into retailers as well as all sorts of supporting players within the industry – packaging companies, jewellery tools and manufacturing equipment, and so on. Visitors to the show are jewellery business people rather than the general public.

Although London is a pre-eminent world city in lots of ways, neither London nor the UK as a whole is considered a world jewellery centre. As a result, the London show is a considerably more intimate affair than the three big global shows that take place each year in Basel, Las Vegas, and (later this month) Hong Kong.

To underline this point, the London show attracts around 450 exhibitors and 9,000 visitors, whereas the Hong Kong show draws almost 3,000 exhibitors and around 40,000 visitors.

But in a way, that’s one of the charms of the London show. The biggest trade shows are spread over vast cavernous areas on multiple floors and sometimes across multiple venues; these shows are always exhausting.

After trekking up and down the aisles for two or three days all of the jewellery starts to look completely indistinguishable; your eyes glaze over and your feet hurt because the organisers don’t provide much seating – they want you to stay on your feet or to sit in someone’s booth and do some actual business.

The London show is much more easily digested. You can see most of the exhibitors in less than a day, take in a couple of seminars, catch up with a few colleagues and friends, and then it’s back to the office by tea-time.

I haven’t made it to the London show for a few years (in part because I was generally travelling out to Hong Kong at this time of year) but it was good to spend a few hours there on Sunday and yesterday.

What did I see? Well, not enough diamonds, for one thing.

Those of us in the diamond business often overlook the non-diamond part of the jewellery trade – everything from pearls, emeralds, sapphires and rubies, to crystals, beads, garnet and quartz, and I will often discover some exotica that’s completely new to me such as vesuvianite or labradorite.

So what sort of trends were in evidence at IJL 2009?

Well the first thing to say is that bling is definitely out. Of course there are still diamonds and there’s still gold, but the brashness and excess of the worst of the bling culture has been swept away by the storm surge of the last 12 months or so. It actually felt like a blessed relief.

Jewellery designers have recognised the changing consumer sentiment (they’re consumers too…) and produced designs that are more understated and subtle than before.

It’s no surprise that natural and organic shapes are becoming more prevalent: references to nature including leaves, berries, and butterflies are emerging, with silver and enamel leaves being almost inescapable.

But I also see a stripping back of nature to raw anatomy – skeletal structures, bones, coral, fossils. Sometimes this tips over into all-out Gothic: spikes, or skulls and crossbones (Damien Hirst famously took this theme to excess with his ‘For the Love of God‘ platinum skull featuring 8,601 flawless diamonds).

At the upper end of the jewellery market there seems to be a nostalgic yearning for times gone by – the seductive allure of femmes fatales, mid-century chic, sophisticated evening wear which is rooted in the security of the past rather than the uncertainty of the present.

We like to think that much of the jewellery that we’ve chosen for diamondthrills fits into this last category rather well. It has a timeless appeal, with occasional passing references to art deco, late vintage and retro.

We don’t use exotica materials – one of the reasons that we stick to diamonds and gold is that they defy the passing fads of last season’s fashion. We’re aware of fashions as they come and go but our jewellery will remain attractive, desirable and wearable for years to come.

So whether you want to dazzle with diamonds for just one special night, or commit to owning something that will stand the test of time, browse our gallery [coming later this week....] and be confident that with diamondthrills jewellery you will never be out of fashion.