I think everybody has at least one “grail” item, something you can’t easily get, but desperately want — made of “unobtainium”, to use my dad’s terminology. Whatever your grail item is, it’s rare, and if you find one, the price probably makes you cry. Mine is Historic Rings: Four Thousand Years of Craftsmanship, by Diana Scarisbrick. It’s out of print, it’s a foreign publication… it has all the makings of a quest, and it can be mine for as little as $600.

I don’t know what it is about rings. I keep coming back to them. I wear them, I make them, I obsess over them. They’re my favorite type of jewelry. Rings are the most easily seen and admired by the wearer, and oft-seen and admired by others. You do a lot with your hands. To come across a book covering a collection of almost 800 rings — 1,400 photographs!! — well, that’s pretty much the Ultimate Jewelry Book, Ever, as far as I’m concerned.

I just keep telling myself, one of these days… and then watch the price inch higher. Le sigh.

So that’s my grail book. What’s yours?