On the Kaizarin website are featured jewelry pieces starting at £ 120 (Rs 10,080) for white pearl drop white gold earrings or grey pearl drop yellow gold earrings or open diamond star and heart ring, and at the highest end is the diamond necklace in white gold at £ 5,500 (Rs 4,62,000) or the green tourmaline cocktail ring at £ 4,500 (Rs 3,78,000). "My USP (unique selling proposition) is engraving on pure gold. My designs are created to allow my customers to put their own unique message onto the jewelry…to make the piece valuable and pretty… A few tiny diamonds contribute to it becoming luxurious and a class above anything else in the market.” Endeavoring to promote exclusively personalized products, Kalifa comments, "I’m perhaps never happier than when designing completely bespoke pieces to the most exacting of standards.”
Teaming up with artisans in India, she notes, "I have two partners whom I work with in India, each of them specializing in different requirements of jewelry style. I rely on both to deliver the best quality and finish in all they produce.” On the website is written, "Their expertise is truly unparalleled, I wouldn’t entrust my products with anyone less.” Each piece of jewelry is stamped by the Assay office in the UK with Kaizarin’s maker’s mark and 750 hallmark. As proclaimed on her website, Kaizarin jewelry "lends itself to timeless fashion over fast fashion, effortlessly worn to empower and inspire.”
Rather than employ permanent staff, she prefers to hire and engage workers on contract. Assisting Kalifa with her branding and public relations is Abdul Adama whom she describes as "one priceless comrade.” Her niece Ariana Mistry helps with photo shoots and modeling "and is one hell of a salesperson.” She also markets her jewelry through "a multi-label fine jewelry outlet called Jewelstreet that were impressed by my designs and have asked me to join their site.”
Qualified with a business and finance degree, Kalifa launched her career in project and operations management but decided to take a break once her first son was born. "To keep my brain ticking, I took a course in jewelry making. The course gave me the perfect balance of design, technique, patience, perfection and result.” Once she succeeded in selling her first few pieces to a select client base, she knew she had found her vocation.
Born in Poona to Firoze and Perviz Mistry who first ran a business in Poona, and later in Kuwait under the name of Hamad and Firoze Trading and Contracting, Kaizarin feels "having worked for a jewelry business and being brought up in a business background it was inevitable this would be my chosen path. Jewelry was always a passion which led to becoming a hobby and eventually into a business.” Her eldest brother Kaiomarz now runs the family business in Kuwait while second brother Burzin runs an independent business in London. Having spent 12 years of her life in Kuwait, she studied at the Carmel Convent School and Gulf English School before she left for London at the age of 15 to pursue college and university studies. Whilst London has been "home for almost 30 years,” Kuwait, to her, was "an amazing melting pot of various nationalities, cultures and classes.”
She appreciates that her husband Mickey (Maneck) Kalifa who is the chief financial officer of a sports company, Sportech, has "supported me and kept me giggling through the past 26 years.” Their elder son Kiyan, now 19 years old, studies business in Manchester while younger son Arya, who is 16, has started his A levels. Enjoying her role as a mother she mentions that it is "lots of fun to be around (them) and challenging at the same time.”
According to Kaizarin, "Parsis are amazing chameleons, they seem to fit in and do well in any environment. We have friends who are entrepreneurs and are doing extremely well and others who are doctors, lawyers and bankers. It comes down to education and hard work, something our community has mastered.”
Raised in a Parsi household, "I have been taught to respect our traditions,” says Kaizarin, adding, "Our tenets of good thoughts, good words and good deeds work best for me and so if this is all I leave my children with, I have done well.”
Most members of the Parsi community, believes Kaizarin, "have been raised to appreciate the value of gold. I have always seen very tasteful and understated jewelry on most Parsis rather than loud and garish jewelry that is more a show of wealth than class. Thus my philosophy on jewelry and my life is that we should acquire things that will last through generations (and) enjoy wearing them as much as possible rather than keeping them safe in a locker.” As reiterated on her website
www.kaizarin.com, "Jewelry is to be cherished.” She would like each of her pieces to be "a testament to timelessness.”
Whilst impressing clients with her honesty and work ethics as also the craftsmanship of her handmade products, Kaizarin has built "a trustworthy relationship with my customers. I would love to open my own store one day but that will come about slowly. In the meantime I hope to successfully build my brand.”