The Work
One thing.Done completely.
We make one Cuban link. This page is the record of the work that goes into it: what changed, when it changed, and what every chain goes through before it ships. Entries are dated as they happen.
How it gets made
We do not use one factory. The chain, the clasp and the plating are each made somewhere different, which is slower and harder to run than handing the whole piece to a single supplier.
Finding the plating took the longest. We tested eight factories. The first round of samples came back and none of them were good enough, so we sent a second round to all eight and waited again. That got us to four we would work with, and one we now use. A materials scientist works on the coating with us.
A run takes about 60 days. Most of that is the curvature and the construction of the links, which is slow work in 316L steel because steel is harder to shape than gold. The tolerance we hold is a tenth of a millimetre, and every pre-production sample is measured by hand before a run is signed off.
The clasp
The bracelet clasp came open on its own. Not often, but often enough, and when it did the piece was usually gone before the owner noticed. Some of those men opened a claim and we replaced the piece. Some of them did not:
“I really liked the bracelet however, I am not a fan of the clasp. It came off while I was wearing it and was lost as I didn’t feel it when it came off. I’ll be looking for a replacement from a company that has a different clasp type.”Chester H. · Chapel Hill, TN · December 2024
We reworked the mechanism, and owners noticed without being told:
“First 8.5" bracelet had a clasp issue - and I lost it. Balanzi stood behind product and replaced bracelet. This one seems to be "new & improved" as clasp can’t be pulled apart - as first one.”Edmund F. · Leesburg, FL · October 2025
It was still not right. In June 2026 an owner on his second bracelet told us the spring was too soft and that his replacement was worse than the original. He was correct.
In August 2026 we found the spring in the new batch was below our standard, stopped production, and wrote to every customer with an open order to say so and to offer a full refund to anyone who did not want to wait. Orders were late because of it.
Of the 172 faults reported to us since February 2026, 82 named a clasp. Chain and bracelet both, and the bracelet is where they concentrate. It is the reason the mechanism has now changed twice. The August change is weeks old. We are not calling it settled.
Before it ships
Every chain is measured and checked by hand before it goes into the box. The chains that pass ship. The ones that do not, do not. This is what that looks like.
Measured · 30 June 2025
The tolerance we hold an 8 mm chain to is a tenth of a millimetre. This one came off the run at 8.01.
Flagged · 29 July 2026
The first ten chains of a new run get gone through one at a time, every clasp and every link. That batch cost us five things: a latch that came back different from the sample, clasp tension that was close but not identical, tolerances we wanted tighter, and on one chain out of the ten, a single link spaced slightly off from the rest. One link, one chain, and it still went back.
Sent back · 6 July 2026
A batch of new clasps came back from plating with the finish wrong on some of them. They went back to be re-done. Nobody was ever going to notice the two circled below at arm’s length, which is not the standard.
“Even with the things I flagged, this first batch is already better than what we currently sell. I’m still not happy though, because the goal was never just better.”Josef · founder · 29 July 2026
Signature · Vol. 1
Every lesson from two years of making one chain, put into a run of 44 numbered chains. Three changes, each one you can see or feel:
Sharper link shaping
Tighter geometry and cleaner edges. Less visible space between the links.
More tension through the clasp
You feel the resistance before it clicks.
A second polishing pass
One additional finishing pass before the chain reaches inspection.
Case files
When something goes wrong.
We do not ask for the piece back. You keep it. We send a new one. No return label, no inspection.
Since February 2026, 172 reported faults have been put right. 82 named the clasp. 79 were the wrong size. 22 had something break. Those three overlap. One report can be a clasp and a wrong size both, so they come to more than 172. Half were resolved inside about a day, and some took a great deal longer.
We are not going to print all 172 of them at you. Below are 21: the ones we were slow on, the ones we got wrong, the ones that failed a second time, and the ordinary ones in between so you can see what ordinary looks like. Newest first.
We sent the wrong size twice, then said it had arrived when it had not.
His chain came in the wrong size. The replacement came in the wrong size too. He was then told it had been delivered when it had not, and had to chase us on Instagram before anyone checked. A third one went out on 2 August and was still in transit when he wrote, held up by weather in the country it ships from. Warranty replacements come from the manufacturer rather than our warehouse, which is the honest reason they are slow. It is not a good enough one.
It was gone before he noticed. He had already stopped wearing the chain because it had done the same thing. Both covered, thirty six minutes after he wrote.
He bought it in January 2024 and had worn it every day since. Exchanged under the guarantee. He kept the original.
He said it faded. It was worse than that.
He sent a photograph of grey showing through and said the chain had faded. It had not faded. It was a plating gap, a spot where the coating never covered the joint between two links in the first place, which is a fault in how the piece was made and not in how he wore it. We told him that, in those words, and replaced it.
She wrote to ask where her replacement was. It had not gone out. Fifty seven hours from her message to it being on its way, in the middle of the summer she had wanted to wear it.
It arrived looking like it had already been worn.
He asked whether we had sent him a refurbished piece. Replaced without arguing about whose marks they were.
His photograph, the morning it arrived. Her bracelet came off while she was out and she did not get it back. Answered the same night, covered the next morning.
The bracelet had already gone the same way, in the water. Both replaced. This one took ten days, not a morning.
Chain and bracelet both. She confirmed the lengths she wanted at lunchtime and the replacements were processed that afternoon. Nothing came back.
Two orders affected. Replaced the next morning.
He wrote asking how the return process works. There is not one. The right lengths were processed three hours later and he kept the first set.
The 22 inch sits at the top of the chest, which is what it is meant to do. It was still not what she had in mind. A 24 went out fifty six minutes after she wrote.
A bracelet we had already replaced once failed again. Replaced again, two hours after the claim.
Our first answer was the wrong one.
She told us the bracelet and the pendant chain were far too short. Our first reply told her the sizes were listed on the page and were exactly what she ordered. True, and the wrong thing to say. We went back the next morning and sent the 8.5. The crucifix chain we could not fix. Twenty two inches is the longest we make it, so for that piece we offered her the money back.
His son’s. He could not find the order number. Replaced the next morning anyway.
And the bracelet was the wrong size. Both replaced the same afternoon.
Replaced two days later.
Replacement processed the same day.
The clasp failed on his necklace.
Replaced under the guarantee. He kept the original.
“Great piece. This is actually a replacement for the original necklace. The clasp failed on the original one. thanks for the replacement and the great customer service.”Amos J. · San Antonio, TX
She ordered a size too small.
Her mistake, not ours. Covered the same way.
“when I asked to exchange my bracelet for a larger size, they responded quickly and handled everything seamlessly. The replacement was mailed to me fast and completely free of charge!”Connie R. · Leesburg, VA
The clasp was defective. He kept the chain anyway.
Two years before this page existed, the answer was already the same one: keep it, a new one is coming.
“Even thought my clasp was defected. They let me keep it and are sending me another chain for free. thanks Balanzi!”Alfredo L. · Norwalk, CA
The quotes are from reviews the customers published themselves, word for word. We have not tidied their punctuation. The entries without a quote come from support threads, which are private: the date, the fault and what we did are ours to state, their words are not.
The record grows as the work does.
Our guaranteeSource
Every photograph on this page was posted in the Workshop first, on the day it was taken. It is a private room where the chain gets worked on out loud, including the parts that go wrong. There is nothing for sale in it.
The Workshop