A Woman's $12 Thrift Store Find Inspired Her Custom Engagement Ring - Business Insider

You can thrift just about anything these days — and that includes your engagement ring.

Just ask Adele Snowball, a 32-year-old model from Australia.

She's always loved vintage jewelry and had permission from her mother to repurpose family heirloom pieces into an engagement ring when the time came.

So, when Oliver Raggat, her boyfriend of three years, proposed with a toy ring during a trip to Japan, it was time to start designing the real thing.

They didn't need to do much work, though.

To the couple's surprise, Snowball found all the inspiration she needed in a $12 secondhand ring at a Japanese antique store.

Raggatt, 32, had just moved back to his home city of Adelaide from Melbourne when they matched on the dating app, Snowball told Business Insider.

"Our first date was at a hidden blues bar. We found we had a lot in common, like music and our love of vinyl records," she said. "We ran in the same circles and had been to the same concerts."

Though they'd never met until that date, he'd even once watched Snowball walk in a fashion show.

"Since then, we've been inseparable," she said.

Raggatt knew he and Snowball would one day design an engagement ring using her family's pieces. But he also wanted to surprise her.

Two weeks before their trip, he had the idea to find a Gashapon ring — a piece of costume jewelry from a Japanese toy vending machine — and propose with that first.

Snowball said she "wouldn't leave Olly's side" on their third day in the country, which is when he wanted to sneak off in search of the most "kitschy capsule ring he could find."

Luckily, Snowball chose to take a shopping break at Zara, which gave Raggatt the perfect opportunity.

Within 30 minutes, he'd found a Gashapon machine filled with rings resembling spilled matcha. He inserted a few dollars and out came a sage-green ring in a capsule box shaped like a bottle.

Snowball said she didn't expect a proposal during the trip until she noticed Raggatt acting nervous at the restaurant.

That's probably because he didn't know he'd propose until they got there.

"I looked around and thought to myself, 'If I were proposing to me, I would propose here.' My brain was racing with thoughts of how, when, where, and is this happening?" she said.

After a quick bathroom break to calm her nerves and text her friends, Snowball suggested that she and Raggatt take a selfie. As she set up her phone, he got down on one knee.

"I held my head in my hands and cried for what felt like two minutes but was probably 12 seconds," she said. "Finally, I looked up and said yes as he tried to put the ring on my shaking hand."

It was pouring rain when the couple left the restaurant, Snowball said, so they took shelter in an empty karaoke bar and called their friends and family to share the news.

"We then sang our favorite songs together, including 'My Sweet Lord' by George Harrison, which is our song," she added.

They then welcomed the company of some Japanese salarymen, or office workers, who had missed their train home. They chose to celebrate with them and buy the newly engaged couple drinks.

The couple left Tokyo the day after getting engaged. On the way out, Raggatt stopped in their hotel's bathroom and found a large, plastic diamond on the floor.

"He came out and gave me the diamond, which I then put on the ring," Snowball recalled. "It fit perfectly!"

She said their creation gave them the idea to design a real engagement ring inspired by the colorful statement piece Raggatt proposed with.

The couple traveled to Osaka, where they found a "full to the brim antique store" called the BB American Village Free Market.

While Raggatt browsed film cameras, Snowball shopped for jewelry. Though she wasn't looking for another engagement ring, one caught her eye.

"I tried it on, it fit my ring finger, and I took of photo of it for inspiration," she said. "Later on, Olly asked again what I think I might like for my real engagement ring. I said I wouldn't mind something like the one I saw in the store."

Ironically, it featured a green stone and a clear crystal — mirroring the green band and plastic diamond on her first engagement ring.

He snuck back to the market the following day and purchased the vintage piece for about $12.

Raggatt quickly worked with a local shop owner to plan another meaningful proposal.

"He had placed the ring in a Mickey Mouse wallet at one of those shooting games where the prizes are all on a shelf," Snowball said. "He is very good at this type of game and shot it down first go. Then he got back down on one knee to reveal the ring from the antique store."

As they celebrated their second engagement, the shop owner serenaded them with a rendition of "What a Wonderful World" on electric guitar.

Not only did the colors of the thrifted ring match the toy ring that Raggatt proposed with, but Snowball's birthstone is also emerald.

So, the couple decided to work with the jeweler Kip Wilckens to create another version of the secondhand piece using materials from rings belonging to her grandmother and great-grandmother.

"It all just seemed so right. I never gave it another thought," Snowball said.

The custom ring, which was made for Snowball in a month, features a lab-gown diamond and a green tsavorite garnet stone. They sit atop a bezel setting in 18-carat yellow gold.

When asked whether she wears her original two rings, Snowball said she doesn't. Instead, she keeps them both in the matcha-themed capsule box and plans to incorporate them into their wedding day, which they're planning for 2026.

"Whenever I look at the custom ring, I don't just think about how much it sparkles or how cool it is," Snowball said. "I think of how Olly proposed, the typhoon, 'Kill Bill,' drunken salarymen, and that it was found in a tiny Japanese antique store and reborn from my grandparents' gold."

Correction: February 21, 2025 — An earlier version of this story misspelled the name of the jeweler the couple worked with to design the custom ring. It's Kip Wilckens, not Kip Wilkins.