Golden Bachelor ring designer recalls Gerry and Theresa’s ‘remarkable’ high

The Moment

Somewhere between a fairy-tale proposal in Costa Rica and a four-month marriage that ended in televised heartbreak, there was a moment when Gerry Turner and Theresa Nist really did look like the happy ending.

According to longtime Bachelor jeweler Neil Lane, who spoke in a new interview, that moment was very real. He remembers the Golden Bachelor and his final rose pick beaming after Gerry slipped a Neil Lane ring on Theresa’s finger and promised forever.

Now, of course, that same couple is lobbing accusations instead of love notes. Gerry has revisited the breakup in his memoir, Golden Years: What I’ve Learned from Love, Loss, and Reality TV, saying he felt “trapped” before the wedding. Theresa, for her part, has said he once made a shocking, violent remark about her, though even she has publicly questioned whether he was joking.

In the middle of it all? Neil Lane, calmly polishing diamonds and reminding everyone that once he hands over the ring, what happens next is above his pay grade.

The Take

Here’s what fascinates me: the guy who makes the ring is the only one in this story who refuses to be messy.

While Gerry and Theresa’s split has turned into a late-in-life version of “War of the Roses,” Neil is out here talking about hope, craftsmanship, and how rare it is to find love at any age. He calls them a “remarkable couple,” wishes they’d stayed together, and leaves the mud-slinging to everyone else.

It’s almost like the ring is a tiny, sparkling Switzerland – completely neutral while the countries around it go to war.

The whole thing says a lot about how we consume love stories now, especially for people over 60. We begged for a Golden Bachelor because we wanted proof that romance doesn’t expire. We got it: a widower, a widow, instant chemistry, teary adult children, a lavish TV wedding. And then reality crept in, as it usually does, right around the time the cameras packed up.

Lane insists he mostly sees couples at “their happiest,” in that sugar-high window when the proposal’s fresh and the real-life logistics (finances, families, geography, health) haven’t had time to ruin the mood. On TV, that high is sold as the whole story. In real life, it’s the trailer, not the movie.

And it’s not just Gerry and Theresa. Lane’s latest Golden Bachelor project is another ring – an 18-karat cushion-cut dazzler with side triangles – for new lead Mel Owens and his final pick, Peg Munson. Two triangle diamonds for their separate lives, a big center stone for their new unity; you can practically hear the voice-over.

Meanwhile, in the same breath, he’s weighing in on Taylor Swift’s engagement ring from Travis Kelce (not his design, and he still gushes over it) and mourning the theft of French crown jewels from the Louvre as a “devastating” loss for history and designers.

So while former reality lovers are throwing rhetorical punches, the jeweler is giving us a reminder: the symbol can be flawless even when the relationship is not. The diamond is forever; the marriage, not always.

Receipts

Here’s what’s solid versus what’s spiraling through the rumor mill:

Confirmed

• Gerry Turner and Theresa Nist met and got engaged on ABC’s The Golden Bachelor, with the proposal filmed in Costa Rica and aired in 2023 (as seen on the series finale).
• The pair married in a televised wedding and later announced their decision to divorce after only a few months; they discussed the split in a sit-down on ABC’s morning programming in 2024.
• Neil Lane, the long-running ring designer for the Bachelor franchise, provided Gerry’s engagement ring to Theresa and later described the couple as “remarkable” and inspirational for older viewers, in a new interview published in November 2025.
• Lane says he does not track what happens to the rings once they leave his hands; Gerry and Theresa’s engagement ring is, in his words, no longer in his “orbit.”
• Lane also designed an 18-karat yellow-gold ring with a cushion-cut center diamond and two triangle side stones, approximately 3.5 carats total, for Golden Bachelor Mel Owens’ commitment to Peg Munson, as described in the same interview.
• He publicly praised Taylor Swift’s engagement ring from Travis Kelce – designed by Kindred Lubeck – calling it a historically inspired cushion-style cut and saying Kelce “couldn’t have done better.”
• Lane has condemned the daylight theft of French crown jewels from the Louvre in Paris as a “devastating” cultural and creative loss, emphasizing how historical pieces inspire modern designers.
  

  

Unverified / Contested

• Details of Gerry Turner’s feelings leading up to his wedding – including his reported claim that he felt “trapped” before the ceremony – come from descriptions of his memoir and have not been independently reviewed here.
• Theresa Nist’s account that Turner once made a violent, dismemberment-related remark about her, and her uncertainty over whether he was joking, is her allegation as referenced in coverage; there is no public record of criminal charges tied to that claim.
• Any characterization of current “mud-slinging” between the exes refers to their competing public narratives and media coverage, not to findings by a court.

Backstory (For Casual Readers)

If you dipped out of Bachelor Nation after the early 2000s, here’s the quick refresher. The Golden Bachelor is the franchise’s senior spin-off, built around people in their 60s and 70s looking for a second (or third) great love. Gerry Turner, a retired restaurateur and widower in his seventies, became the first Golden Bachelor and quickly connected with Theresa Nist, a New Jersey-based securities professional and widow. They got engaged on the show, were married soon after in a televised event, and then stunned fans by announcing a divorce just months later.

Neil Lane, a celebrity jeweler who has designed countless rings for the franchise, has become almost a recurring character himself: he appears in finales, presents custom rings, and ties each design to a little story about love and symbolism. In this latest interview, he looks back at Gerry and Theresa’s early joy while also weighing in on a new Golden Bachelor couple, Taylor Swift’s headline-making ring, and even a major museum jewel heist in Paris.

What’s Next

Where does this glittery-but-messy saga go from here?

For Gerry and Theresa, the next chapter will likely play out in two lanes: his memoir tour and her response. If he continues to revisit their breakup in detail, Theresa may feel pressure – or be offered incentives – to tell more of her own story. That could mean more interviews, more conflicting memories, and more uncomfortable headlines for fans who just wanted a sweet second-chance romance.

For Neil Lane, the road ahead is much simpler: more rings. His latest Golden Bachelor design for Mel Owens and Peg Munson will now carry the burden of audience expectations – can this older couple “succeed” where Gerry and Theresa didn’t? Like it or not, every sparkling close-up of that 18-karat cushion-cut will double as a progress report on their love story.

And in the background, pop culture keeps feeding the jewelry machine. Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce’s engagement ring will be dissected for years, and the Louvre theft will continue to haunt designers who relied on royal jewels for inspiration.

Maybe that’s the real lesson here: rings are history, PR, and personal milestones all wrapped into one tiny object. They can’t guarantee happy endings – not for young love, not for senior love, not even for royalty. But they do leave a mark, long after the relationship itself has cracked.

The question is how much of that mark we want to keep putting on television.

What about you? When you look at Gerry and Theresa’s whirlwind Golden Bachelor saga, do you see a brave late-in-life gamble that just didn’t work out, or a warning sign that televised fairy tales – at any age – ask too much of real people?