Valentine’s Day, the day known for romantic couples to shower their other half with gifts and tokens of appreciation. Chocolates, flowers and jewellery are some of the most popular gifts to give and receive and, like any invention, many of these gifts are protected by patents. Whether you celebrate Valentine’s Day or avoid it like the plague, here are some of the ordinary and extraordinary Valentine’s Day patents.

Heart-shaped chocolate

Chocolates are one of the most popular Valentine’s day gifts with a whopping £85 million purchased during the week leading up to Valentine’s Day. There are over 400 patents related to chocolate, one of them being Verlooy Herwig’s design patent for heart-shaped chocolate, filed in 2001. His design has since become a classic gift for loved ones or for yourself.

Diagram sourced from the patent USD449147 S1 Heart-shaped chocolate. Click here to view in PatBase.

Climbing or trailing rose

Roses have always been associated with love and Valentine’s Day, but they also bear significance in patent history. The first plant patent ever granted was to Henry F. Bosenburg in 1931. He intended to lengthen the amount of time that a climbing rose would bloom to match the longer blooming period of non-climbing roses.

Method of making a heart-shaped diamond

Jewellery and diamonds are a popular and fancier of showing appreciation to the people you love and it is only fitting to be able to gift a heart-shaped diamond! In 2002, Ami Haimoff patented a new way to make heart-shaped diamonds. The process involves cutting two pear-shaped diamonds and placing them side-by-side in a way that creates a heart shape.

Diagram sourced from the patent US2001020370 AA Method of making a heart-shaped diamond. Click here to view in PatBase.

Social matching

Internet dating is now one of the most popular ways to meet your significant other, with 22% of spouses now meeting online. Online dating site, Eharmony, claims that every 14 minutes someone falls in love on their website, so it’s understandable that they have patented their methods. The “Method and system for identifying people who are likely to have a successful relationship” patent was granted in 2019 and takes into consideration the subscriber’s friend’s input on potential matches based on a matching engine performed by an internal processor. However, some controversy surrounds this patent with critics arguing that it should never have been granted because it’s too close to simple mathematics which cannot be patented.

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