Gretchen Koback Pursel is the new chief people officer at the company formerly known as Saks Global.
New designers ‘emerge’ at Centurion show
Babette Shennan, Stanislav Drokin and Rhyme & Reason are the winners of this year’s Centurion Emerging Designer competition and, as such, exhibited their jewelry at the show.

Scottsdale, Ariz.--Babette Shennan, Stanislav Drokin and Rhyme & Reason are the winners of this year’s Centurion Emerging Designer competition and, as such, exhibited their jewelry at the show.
In its sixth year, the contest, sponsored by Stuller, drew 90 entries, which were judged by Michael O’Connor, GIA’s global jewelry manufacturing arts director Mark Mann and Stuller’s Executive Director of Product Development Gary Baines. The judges narrowed it down to 12 finalists.
The Centurion Board of Retail Advisors chose two winners out of the 12, awarding them each a free exhibition space at Centurion.
Centurion President Howard Hauben awarded the third exhibition space to Rhyme & Reason because they were the winner of the 2013 Future of Design business incubator competition, of which he is a sponsor.
RELATED CONTENT: G&G Creations named ‘Future’ winner
Boston-based Rhyme & Reason is the new name for the jewelry brand formerly called G&G Creations, the product of designers Vahe Ghazarian, Esin Guler and Mihran Guler.
Shennan is a graduate gemologist of the Gemological Institute of America and, in 2010, won the Silver Trend Project design competition, which is sponsored by HSN. She also won Best in Show at the Women’s Jewelry Association’s Designer by the Bay event in Northern California last year.
Drokin, from Kharkiv in the Ukraine, founded his own jewelry atelier in 1994 and has studied in gemological centers in the Ukraine, Germany and Poland. He has won various design competitions in Ukraine and Russia and earned a master’s degree in design in 2011.
“We received a record number of entries this year, and they were all amazing. We’re proud to be able to offer the winners an unparalleled opportunity to meet the top prestige jewelers in the United States, and we’re equally proud to offer our Centurion attendees this level of outstanding global talent as an exclusive first introduction,” Hauben said.
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