Peter Zantis with the original watchmaking hammer his father Ange Zantis made when he was 16. Part of the watchmaker’s apprenticeship was making some of the tools. Photo: John Thistleton.
Peter and Belinda Zantis are closing their long-running jeweller’s shop in Goulburn. A watchmaker, jeweller and gemologist, Peter has been in the shop for 50 years. He is busier than ever, completing orders for engagement rings, resizing rings, and repairing and remodelling jewellery.
“It’s lovely when someone brings in something that hasn’t been worn for years, and Peter resizes it, polishes it up and then their excitement, ‘Oh wow, it’s just like brand new’,” Belinda said.
Peter added: “It’s a happy industry.”
And one that runs deeply in his family. His father Ange, a watchmaker, established the business in 1947.
The couple feels it’s time to retire and do other things.
“It gets physically harder – you may not think so, but harder to see things and harder picking up small things,” Peter said.
They will close Zantis Jewellers in October.
“I know a few young people in the trade starting out and I am just going to give them a lot of our soldering, manufacturing and gem-testing stuff to give them a good start,” Peter said.
They are reminiscing how Ange Zantis, a flamboyant, generous and energetic retailer, travelled by train from his home town of Inverell soon after the war to Goulburn. His aunty Georgina Comino had tipped off her 21-year-old nephew that the local jeweller wanted to sell his shop following the death of his wife. He had been trading since the early 1900s.
The Goulburn jeweller, Georgina and Ange sat down at the nearby Bon Ton Cafe where the young watchmaker handed over 300 pounds to buy the shop. Georgina said they needed a contract, so the jeweller wrote out the details in a line or two on a serviette in the cafe and signed his name, having handed over the keys.
As nightfall approached, Ange was attempting to open his newly acquired shop with a bunch of keys when a policeman came by, suspicious of the stranger struggling to enter the jeweller’s front door. Flourishing the serviette at the officer was pointless. Later at the police station where Ange was being held, Georgina was able to establish her nephew’s bona fides.
Ange later married Catherine (Nina) Sourry from Armidale, and belonged to Rotary group, the Chamber of Commerce and just about every other organisation in town, including car, fishing, gem and poultry clubs. He owned trotters and thoroughbreds for a while and Peter and Belinda donated his stables at the Goulburn Recreation Ground to the council following his death.
Ange helped the Acclimatisation Society stock Sooley Dam with brown trout, and had a variety of animals as pets on his farm and once dabbled in commercial Angora goats.
Peter and Belinda Zantis are closing their jeweller’s shop in October and will spend more time with their children and four grandchildren. Another grandchild’s arrival is imminent, and they plan to continue living in Goulburn and enjoying their home. Photo: John Thistleton.
When Peter finished high school in 1976, aged 18, he began work at the shop, undertaking a watchmaking apprenticeship, and, unlike Ange, also did a jeweller’s apprenticeship.
Working in the health service, Belinda began helping at the shop on Saturday mornings in 2001 and following Ange’s sudden passing in 2005, she became full time in March 2006. The couple acquired the business in 2009.
Years earlier in Ange’s day, the shop relocated to 210 Auburn Street opposite Belmore Park, but the family retained the original premises at 280 Auburn Street as a workshop.
After 20 years, Zantis Jewellers moved into the then-Argyle Mall (Goulburn Plaza) and enjoyed some of its best years thanks to the increased foot traffic. The couple continued there for nearly 30 years before moving back to the original shop. Peter and Belinda added next door at 278 Auburn Street and combined both premises into one shop focused on upmarket jewellery.
The family has seen Angus and Coote open and shut twice in Goulburn, and Goldmark, Michael Hill and Estreich Jewellers from Bowral all open and close.
Cutting rings from fingers is a regular task. One recent Monday, Peter cut four rings from one man’s fingers.
“The calls we get from nursing homes, and Peter will go up and cut rings off when hands are swollen and causing problems,” Belinda said. “He does that in his own time. There is never a charge.”
About the only time he has said no was to a request to set a diamond in a tooth.
“It’s a dentist’s job,” Peter said.
Overall, though, he believes if you sell jewellery you have to provide a good service in repairing precious items and remodelling them on the premises rather than sending them away.
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