Before it was time for Justin Bieber to pop the question to Hailey Baldwin, he needed a diamond to put on her finger. His manager Scooter Braun knew just the jeweler to call.
Braun suggested Jack Solow of Solow & Co. Inc. Diamond Jewelers and Bieber's journey to an engagement ring for his future bride began.
Having personally met and spent time with the pop star years ago, Solow was ready to deliver a diamond perfectly fit for his famous new client.
"I was very genuinely excited for him and I had heard that he was with somebody very, very special and that they had bonded over personal things and I was just very, very happy like I would be for any young man who's on that next stop of his life, but for Justin, of course, it's that much more special and that much more visible for everybody," Solow explained to E! News exclusively.
As Solow recalled for E! News, the star had some ideas for how he wanted the engagement ring to look.
"Justin had a big hand in it," the jeweler said. "He had certain design elements that he wanted and he had certain expectations and I think we delivered."
For example, he wanted the focus to be on the diamond. "It was about the diamond. I think he knew very well what Hailey wanted in a ring, but he wanted it very much to be about a very special diamond. He left it in my hands to try and select the most beautiful diamond for someone like Hailey."
After contemplating diamond shapes best fit for the model's hand—including a cushion cut and oval—Bieber decided on the latter and wanted to incorporate 18 karat yellow gold. "My guess is that it was important to Hailey," Solow said of the gold choice.
"The ring is beautiful," Solow noted. "There's no doubt."
After exchanging images of choices and going over design elements, the ring was ready in just a few weeks—and then it was time for the diamond to be personally delivered by Solow himself.
As fans well know, Bieber proposed while the two were vacationing at Baker's Bay on Great Guana Cay, so Solow met with Bieber the Friday morning before they jetted off.
As the jeweler recalled to E! News, he sat down with Bieber at a table and showed him all the details of the ring through a magnifying jeweler's loupe. The star's reaction to the sparkler was just as you'd expect. "Like any other young man, he said, 'Wow, it's gorgeous," Solow described.
"There was one moment when he looked into the diamond and I said, 'What do you see inside that diamond?' He goes, 'I think I see Hailey's face,' so that was kind of cute," Solow remembered with a laugh.
According to feedback from the couple's team, Baldwin "really loves" the finished product. "I was very, very gratified," Solow told E! News. The jeweler also made a $5,000 donation to the charity of Hailey's choice, the Carol M. Baldwin Breast Cancer Fund.
No matter what critics may say about their seemingly sudden engagement, Solow felt that there was a "certain serenity and peacefulness" about the star at this time.
As the jeweler mentioned, "I had a sense that he was very, very ready for this decision."