Cary Santiago's animal chic

complements Diagold's sparkle

- Joseph L. Garcia

THERE was no escaping the glam at the Diagold and Cary Santiago show on Sept. 11. Amid all the (literal) gold and diamonds (not just on the jewels, but the clothes themselves), one felt strangely inadequate in plain black and white.

Prior to the show at the Shangri-La The Fort, the Cebu-based jewelry brand (which was collaborating with the Cebuano designer), showed off its new collection in a showcase at the center of the ballroom. The collection, called Crown Jewels, showed bold colored gemstones — rubies, sapphires, emeralds, and yellow diamonds — in royal-worthy settings, surrounded and paved by halos of diamonds.

The jewels were worn on the runway: dresses accented with diamond drop pendants, pink sapphire ear-drops, a large diamond brooch, an emerald parure, a necklace made of numerous rows of sapphires, and more than a sprinkling of yellow diamonds.

The clothes held their own, despite the sheer weight of the jewels (we noted that some of the stones were as large as bird eggs).