Saad Akhtar — Zanvari
Saad Akhtar
Saad Akhtar is the proprietor of Zanvari and the third generation of a family that has made jewellery in Saddar, Karachi since 1947. The firm his grandfather founded — Hameed Jewelers & Sons — opened its workshop the same year Pakistan itself was founded. Zanvari is its flagship: the same craft, the same quarter of the city, carried into a new century from Shop No. 5, Gems Jewelers and Trade Centre, Blenken Street.
Three generations, one bench
The craft passed from grandfather to father to son, and what passed with it was never only technique. It was a conviction that jewellery should be made with intention, set with genuine stones, and built to outlast the person who buys it. Zanvari works in 925 sterling silver — never silver-plated base metal — finished with rhodium or 22k gold plating. That standard is not Saad's invention; it is his inheritance. His job is to keep it.
What he actually does
The title is proprietor; the work is practical. Saad selects the stones — natural ruby, emerald, sapphire, aqeeq and feroza chosen one at a time for clarity and character, and D-colour VVS1 moissanite that ships with its GRA grading card. He assigns each order to a karigar, because Zanvari keeps no warehouse: every piece is made by hand after it is ordered. And he checks the finished work. Every piece that leaves the Saddar workshop leaves under his eye — the sizing, the setting, the plating — before a courier ever touches it. The lifetime free replating promise — never a promotion, always the policy — is his to honour.
Why the Journal exists
Saad writes the Zanvari Journal because most jewellery advice online in Pakistan is written to sell, not to inform. The Journal's guides answer the questions customers actually ask on WhatsApp: what moissanite is and is not, how to catch fake silver before paying for it, what a grading card actually proves. If a guide talks a reader out of the wrong purchase, it has done its job. Start with these three:
- Moissanite vs diamond in Pakistan — the honest comparison
- How to spot fake silver jewellery — 7 tests every buyer should know
- What a GRA card actually is
Shorter answers — sizing, delivery times, exchanges and replating — live on the FAQs page.
Where to find him
The workshop is at Shop No. 5, Gems Jewelers and Trade Centre, Blenken Street, Saddar, Karachi 74400 — open Monday to Friday, 2pm to 8pm, visits by appointment. Message +92 342 8269771 on WhatsApp or write to wecare@zanvari.com. Messages are read at the workshop, not a call centre, and a person answers.