Baroness Jewelers — Local services in Goleta

Our experience to get an engagement ring from Julia at Baroness Jewelers was an absolutely wild ride. To begin, we came in with a diamond already that I inherited and my fiance had already drawn out a rough design. Julia offered a $200 consultation that would go over the basic design, fit my finger, and come up with a proposal. She said that the consultation would be folded into the final price should we go with her work (hint - it wasn't - she tried to charge us for this consultation at the end). Our consultation a few weeks later was almost 3 hours long - we came in with a design already, and the only meaningful things that came out of the meeting were her sizing my finger and giving us an estimate. We decided to move forward, loving the examples of the work she showed us. It was like pulling teeth trying to get her to agree to a price and write it down. I was uneasy with the price but loved her work enough to go with her anyways. I can't stress enough how high I thought her price was despite us already having the diamond. We had even interviewed several other jewelers in town to get quotes.

For the next 6 months, my partner and I met with Julia at least five different times to go through the design. We thought the ring would be ready in 6 to 8 months, so we started applying more and more pressure for her to complete the design and move on to production. Here are some absolutely bizarre things that happened during this time: We asked for green side stones and told her we would be fine with lab-grown emeralds. She insisted we get real ones. Then a couple months later told me the ones I had selected from her were actually fake costume jewelry. When my partner called her to talk about this she went back to saying they were real. I still don't know what kind of stones are in the ring. She went up in cost multiple times throughout the process. She sent my ring away to be "certified" despite me asking her not to. When she gave us the ring at the end, she did not produce any certification, despite trying to charge us for it. She used a different metal than what we asked for/agree to initially. She tried to sell us other items relentlessly despite being months behind schedule. She tried to charge us for "expedited shipping" and for the consultation IN CASH when my partner went in to pick up the ring and pay the final cost. It was extremely sketchy.

Finally, after 8 months, she gave my partner the ring. It's beautiful- nobody can take away that she is an extremely talented jeweler. That is the only reason I'm not giving her 1 star. However, Julia is one of the most difficult people I've ever worked with on anything. She's long winded, conniving, and lies frequently. Most of our meetings consisted of her complimenting her own work and trying to get me to buy more things. Despite her talents, I would strongly suggest getting your jewelry made elsewhere. This place is simply not...

My review is for an experience 3.5 years ago that was so bad that I’m finally taking the time to write it after checking in on this shop (to see if it had been shut down yet) and seeing that a friend had a terrible experience here, which might have been prevented if I had written this review earlier. I hate leaving bad reviews but feel the need to warn people to stay away!

I brought my engagement ring to be repaired as the diamond was loose. I also brought an heirloom family ring which had lost a tiny chip emerald. Julia was clearly very knowledgeable and excited to work on the family ring in particular, which she was immediately able to date and identify the country of origin for. There’s no doubting that her knowledge is impressive!

After I left my rings with her, things went wildly south. Over the course of 4 months, I never once got her to call me or return a voicemail. I could only get an update on my work if I happened to get my calls answered (which happened once) or showed up at the store and it happened to be open (rare). Julia and her staff were wildly evasive to the point that I eventually began panicking that I was being robbed of the two most important pieces of jewelry I’ll ever own.

The whole thing resolved with me sobbing outside her store (not being let in because she had an appointment, as has been covered in other reviews) begging for my rings back. She told me she couldn’t give me back the rings because someone was working on my engagement ring off site (though I had been specifically told that she would be working on them personally and would never let them out of her sight). I held my ground and got my grandmother’s ring back, as work had not started on that one. I came back a few days later, as instructed, to get my engagement ring. Credit where it is due, the ring was beautifully repaired and hasn’t had so much as a wiggle in the years since Julia (or her off-site repair person?) finished work on it.

The work ultimately cost 3x more than the estimate and had some sketchy fees added. Julia dismissed my “overreaction” as pregnancy hormones and encouraged me to come back when I had the budget to pay for the other ring to be repaired. I was so relieved to have my items back that I paid in full and never returned. Truly, I cannot summarize how insane the experience was and I highly encourage you to give this business...

STAY AWAY FROM THIS PLACE: This is the strangest and creepiest business I've ever been to. While the owner peppered us with personal questions, I caught her walking outside to see what kind of car we drove. When she saw my BMW, she tried to sell us a cheap bracelet that was allegedly custom-made at $2,500. She was so intrusive and I was only there to get a new watch battery. The owner kept telling me she was a watch expert, but couldn't reset my two Citizen watches. And then, after telling me that one of them could not be reset, she tried to get me to spend $300.00 to fix it like "new."

Finally, a week of waiting, my wife went back to get my watch(regardless of whether it was finished or not), and the owner refused to get it as she told my wife: "It's Valentine's Day and it's only a day for sales, come back tomorrow." Additionally, there was only one customer in the store at the time! As my wife was leaving, the owner mentioned that she couldn't completely fix my watch anyway.

This is not a professional business. There's something very strange and unusual about it and the way it is operated. Save yourself a frustrating and expensive experience: STAY AWAY FROM THE BARONESS "JEWELERS." It is anything but reputable!

The next day, we went in to pick up my watch, and we finally received it back to the tune of $40.00. The owner who is a self-proclaimed watch expert told us that she spent two hours on the watch, but couldn't get it completely fixed. She also claimed that I had received my money's worth because of all the time she spent on the watch.

So here's the kicker: None of the buttons on the watch worked when we left, but, knowing something was fishy about this store, I took my watch down to Rahmat at Bay Side Watch. He completely fixed the watch so that ALL of the functions work, took about 5 minutes, and didn't charge me a dime!

Just a warning: The owner of Baroness Jewelers is more like a crooked court jester. This place is a complete scam! STAY AWAY!

Oh yeah, and she told my wife I should bring in my watch collection so she could look over them for any future repairs! Hahahahaha! Fool me...