UNDER A SPELL
Chaumet’s latest collection blooms in a beautiful Parisian grand salon. Windy Aulia stands witness to its romance and panache
The romance and passion behind its designs are what make Chaumet timeless
Sitting in a room at 12, Place Vendôme, it’s hard not to wonder if, a century ago, a woman wearing a billowing silk skirt over pannier regalia sat on the exact same chair. There aren’t enough bars in a classical sonata to describe the overwhelming beauty of the grand salon. Therefore the information that the great composer Frédéric Chopin had indeed spent his last days creating a mazurka between the panelled walls of this very room comes as no surprise.
Pascal Bourdariat, Chaumet’s current foreman adds to the aura and begins by sharing the history of the famed quarter. Facing Vendôme’s column from across the ceiling-high open windows of the salon—the perfect Parisian weather of the time of the year makes the setting even more picture-perfect—and listening to him as he switches, rather effortlessly, from English to French and back to English again, adds a sense of romance to the story of Napoleon’s victory and ambition.
And why not? the revered jewellery house indeed has its own place in French history— the house was, in fact, the jeweller to France’s first emperor and his empresses. Tiaras, crowns and diadems have been Chaumet’s staples since then, adding multiple such pieces to the gilded vaults of its archives.
In its over 230 years of history in jewellery making, the atelier has, since its royal appointment, been through many phases. But the house’s jewellery designs continue the tradition of drawing inspiration from nature as well as the social life of 19th-century France. Generation after generation, the brand has proven its excellence with collections like the Liens, Jósephine and Bee My Love, all of which exhibit the house’s close links with French royalty. But with its latest collection, Chaumet reiterates its modernity.
GARDEN TALK
Chaumet’s new high jewellery collection is called Hortensia and is inspired by the hydrangea. Carefully selected from a roster of flora, this particular species serves to differentiate Chaumet from other luxury brands that have previously taken inspiration from camellias, orchids and roses.
It is Chaumet’s new Creative Director, Claire Dévé-Rakoff’s, debut collection. “I love nature,” she says, before adding the fact that the connection between jewellery design and nature is simply a means to reinterpret God’s beautiful creations. The passionate weekend gardening enthusiast even brought stems of hydrangeas from her own garden in the south of France to decorate the salon for the launch event. Claire then states, “There are a lot of naturalistic ideas in Chaumet’s 230-year history. But the house always takes a traditional theme and makes it modern or unusual.”
By now, after hearing Pascal and now Claire, it is clear that the French, in general, and Chaumet, in particular, hold a very high regard for art. In fact, it is like an art in itself. Both Pascal’s and Claire’s passion in creating the Hortensia collection trickles through their C’est bons! and Bien surs!.
The Hortensia collection, as Claire continues, is not about using the biggest or the clearest of diamonds and stones. It is about the harmony between structures. It is a reinterpretation of nature, in this case the beauty of hydrangeas, into a conceptual high jewellery collection.
It is not easy to understand the complexities involved in the creation of the beautiful pieces in the high jewellery collection. At first glance, they look simply magnificent and utterly feminine. Yet, the fact that some pieces take a painstaking 1,000 hours to create, make them beyond couture-worthy. Each piece is a work of art.
The modern element of the collection comes from the fact that various cuts and stones are utilised for just one jewel. As Claire points out, the existing harmony between the structures of nature is translated by the juxtaposition of the stones in the jewellery. Like the Hortensia pink gold ring, for example, features pink opals, brilliant-cut and baguette-cut diamonds, brilliant-cut pink sapphires and, a 1.42-carat cushion-cut pink tourmaline. And, they all come together in harmony—almost like in a 3D painting. We notice similar characteristics in the rest of the collection as well—opals, lapis lazulis, tourmalines, and garnets mix freely with one another.
The Hortensia collection is dubbed as “bijoux de sentiments”—the designs evoke three main feelings, represented by the three dominant shades in the series, much like the hydrangeas species itself. One of them, The Awakenings of Feelings uses a delicate pink palette, while blue sapphires, lapis lazuli and tanzanites set in white gold or platinum symbolise The Audacity of Feelings. The third, The Depth of Feelings comes in deep red rubies and mixed with garnets and tourmaline and is set in rose gold. When I declare that I love the pieces with blue sapphires the most, “that’s because you’re a guy,” Claire says with a chuckle.
“There’s a lot of poetry in the Hortensia collection,” she explains. “Where the Joséphine collection woman wants to be a modern-day princess, the Hortensia woman is more of a romantic,” she adds. That is an interesting motivation for a collection considering that the personality of the very chic Creative Director, is more that of a cool Brogues-wearing Parisian girl than that of the classic French ladies-who-lunch.
Claire admits that her office is nothing like the beautiful Chaumet house at 12, Place Vendôme. “It is more black and white and tac, tac, tac,” which I presume is how the French generally describe any contemporary-looking space.
This is probably why some of the Hortensia high jewellery pieces are designed with a pragmatic approach, but in a romantic outlook. Case in point: The sautoir in pink gold and pink tourmalines, can be worn separately as two short necklaces and a bracelet, while the necklace with blue sapphires comes with a front opening instead of the usual clasp at the back. “This is done so [that] a woman can open her own necklace without the help of her husband or partner,” Pascal chimes in with the house’s little trade secret.
Similar features in the rest of collection also deliberately to push the idea of modernity. Some of the cushion-cut stones are not set in the traditional method, but rather in an invisible manner (an ultra thin stick of gold is used to suspend the individual stones instead of the more common corner prongs).
The blue sapphire bracelet, a personal favourite—also features a row of baguette-cut diamonds. My comment to Claire that their addition into the mix not only gives the bracelet a romantic look but also a contemporary feel, is met with a rather enthusiastic “Mais oui!”