COVER STORY

Making a Life of Love

Fine jeweler Montana Coady celebrates opportunities

PHOTOS BY CHRIS MORTENSON

By Bridgette M. Redman

Montana Coady’s life can sound a little bit like a young girl’s fairy tale at times. Living in Santa Monica, she’s surrounded by diamonds, horses, dogs, a man she loves and her first baby. It’s a life she’s built from enduring passions and a commitment to a business that provides people with unforgettable personal experiences. Her mom was also a horseback rider and Coady, who is a ranked equestrian, was born on a property with ponies and horses in Malibu. “I started riding before I could walk,” Coady said. “It’s always just been in my blood and a part of my life. When I was about 6 years old, I started competing on the circuit.” In the world of showjumping, there are “hunters” and “jumpers.” Coady leaned toward the world of hunters and has continued with that her entire life—taking short breaks to attend USC and have a baby in 2021. “Hunters are where you’re judged on the accuracy, the grace and the elegance,” Coady said. “Everything has to be in stride. The amount of strides in between each jump has to be a certain number. If you’re given a course, the elegance, the beauty, the scope of the horse as well as the horse’s athletic ability to jump (is judged). The rider is traditionally supposed to be effortless looking.” Jumpers, on the other hand, are seen in the Olympics where a horse needs to get around a course as fast as possible and they are judged on speed and how high they jump. It wasn’t a world that appealed to Coady as much as the elegance of hunters. Love is something that opened her other worlds as well—both as a parent, partner and co-founder of Coady Culha, a line of bespoke jewelry that designs custom diamond jewelry and specializes in engagement and wedding rings; and as a competitor in dog shows with the family’s Russell Terrier, Miss

Moneypenny. Coady partnered with Bert Culha in 2012 to become diamond dealers. Culha came from a family of diamond dealers and had the relationships they needed to form a business. They started sourcing stones for clients and creating engagement rings, then it turned into a one-stop shop for bespoke jewelry. “I have a very discerning eye, so a lot of people come to us for that,” Coady said. “Then we have an incredible craftsman that we work exclusively with and he’s incredible. People come to us when they want jewelry and ask us how we would design it. Then I go through the process with our clients and Bert helps us find the stones. Then we have our craftsman create everything bespoke—everything we make is custom and our clientele is solely based on word of mouth.” While they do everything from earrings to necklaces to bracelets, Coady still finds it exciting to work on engagement rings. “It’s such a special purchase for someone, it’s so sentimental,” Coady said. “It’s a once-in-alifetime experience working with the groom or whoever is purchasing the engagement ring and finding that perfect stone for that relationship and coming up with a design that is uniquely theirs, knowing that it is going to make the bride happy and be a surprise.” Their relationship with their clients doesn’t end at the wedding, though. Their brand is focused on building and curating a jewelry collection that is specific to each client. They’ll continue to work with them to create jewelry for special occasions such as an anniversary, Mother’s Day or birthdays. They want to make special, unique pieces for each of those occasions that goes with the rest of their collection. “The most exciting thing about creating jewelry is designing a piece for someone that is meaningful, special and unique, but also a classic and staple item,” Coady said. “So, nothing that is too trendy or is going to be out of style or too out there that you wear for a year and then isn’t relevant anymore. (We design) pieces that can hold the test of time and that you want to pass down to your family, but also you’re able to wear on an everyday basis.” Like her equestrian career, Coady Culha fits in with her lifetime passions. She said she’s always loved people and is a very social person—something that allows her to work well with people and engage in cooperative creation. She describes herself as very creative and a lover of beauty and dressing up. “I love fashion and I’ve always loved jewelry,” Coady said. “So for me, every day it’s fun because I get to kind of dip into all the different parts of myself—my creative side, my social side, my networking side.” She said she’s also a romantic at heart, something that not only helps her in her business, but is what has led to her recent life changes and the creation of a new family. Coady and her partner, Benjamin Randall, met in January 2020 and were set up by her mother. He was then living in New York, but came to visit Coady just as the pandemic hit. He stayed and they eventually moved in together, soon after deciding to start a family. It was this life change that led Coady into the world of dog shows. “I’ve always been fascinated by and loved dogs,” Coady said. “It’s a similar kind of person involved in the horse world and in the dog world.” She had an Irish terrier who wasn’t a show dog, but she took him to get groomed by one of the top dog handlers in the country. She met his show dog and realized she’d love to have one if the opportunity presented itself. When she and Randall got in a relationship, he told her he really wanted a dog and they thought it would be fun to get a show dog. A breeder connected them with a Russell Terrier and they started the process of learning how to be dog show parents. Their pup, who is almost 2 years old, won her major at the Kennel Club of Palm Springs and has qualified for Westminster in November. It also helps that their son, Coady James, also loves the dog. She has high praise for both her partners—her business partner and her boyfriend, both of whom she said were highly supportive of her during her pregnancy and early motherhood. With a supportive community, Coady continues to pursue her dreams—as a mom, businesswoman, equestrian and dog show competitor.