MY LIFE, MY STYLE
The jewellery designer Delfina Delettrez’s chic Parisian home is filled with quirky vintage treasures – much like her wardrobe
Inside Delfina Delettrez’s Paris home
‘I was raised on milk – and fashion,’ says the jewellery designer Delfina Delettrez, glancing over at her mother Silvia Venturini Fendi, the head of accessories at the family’s eponymous fashion house, who has turned up unexpectedly midway through the Bazaar shoot. As a young girl, Delettrez explains, she would beg to do her homework in the atelier (or as she describes it, her ‘second school’), where Karl Lagerfeld was a familiar presence. ‘I knew that when he was in the studio something special was going on because everything was in order,’ she says. ‘Everybody was wearing heels and looking prettier.’
Petite and poised, her dark hair slicked back and wearing black from head to toe, the 29-year-old is emerging as the latest creative force in the illustrious fashion dynasty. Her great-grandparents Eduardo Fendi and Adele Casagrande founded the house in 1925 as a fur workshop, redesigning coats to flatter the female form. Today, Delettrez is infiltrating the traditionally male world of horology, with her first watch collection for Fendi, Policromia.
The range is inspired by the geometric layout of the Palazzo Della Civiltà Italiana in Rome, which is home to Fendi’s headquarters. ‘I’ve always thought of the building as a giant sundial because of all the shadows,’ she says. ‘Each floor has its own marble, almost like different landscapes, and then through the arches you can sometimes see a light blue sky,
sometimes an amazing sunset, or dark clouds. It’s very Magritte.’
Just as Fendi customers can build the bag of their dreams, the Policromia watches are available in 20 models, and can be personalised with precious stones including malachite, tiger’s eye, obsidian and lapis lazuli. The coloured alligator straps are handcrafted in the Fendi workshops, and finished with 18-carat-gold buckles and a sprinkling of brilliant-cut white diamonds. Sophisticated layering of spheres and sectors gives the illusion of movement, even though everything is static. ‘I like to subvert,’ she says. ‘I like jewellery that twirls and twists, that adapts, that changes.’
Delettrez grew up between Rio de Janeiro, where her father, the jewellery designer Bernard Delettrez, was based, and the South of France. She now lives in Rome with her nine-year-old daughter Emma. They travel to Paris regularly for the fashion shows and for weekend breaks, so she has bought herself the bijou pied-à-terre overlooking Place de Furstenberg in the sixth arrondissement where we meet. ‘I really wanted to live in this particular square,’ she says, ‘because it’s like a theatre. There’s always something going on – lovers fight; people play guitar and start singing; painters set up their easels.’ (She also enjoys the fact that her great-aunt Carla Fendi lives on the opposite side.)
The space is filled with tokens from Italy, including beautifully worn floor tiles from Naples, which accent the original parquet. In the living-room, two large mirrored sconces from the entrance to the Roman family home take centre stage, alongside contemporary FontanaArte lighting. Delettrez also collects curiosities such as a large insect shell mounted on
spidery legs that she found in Havana, and one of her most treasured possessions, an ancient, shrunken head encased in a block of yellow amber from the nearby Portes de Vanves market that she assures me is genuine.
Despite the allure of the family business, Delettrez originally studied costume design. ‘Can I tell you the truth?’ she says. ‘I didn’t know what I wanted to do. I knew that I wanted to prove myself in another direction.’ She launched her own independent fine-jewellery brand in 2007 when she was pregnant with Emma (whose father is her ex-boyfriend, the Italian actor Claudio Santamaria). It was an instant cult hit, with fans including Emma Watson and Rihanna spotted wearing the sculptural, almost mechanical pieces.
Their theatricality is offset wonderfully by Delettrez’s androgynous, somewhat Gothic wardrobe, which includes nun’s habits in blue, black and white, bought from the ecclesiastical shops in Rome, worn with a ribbon around the waist. ‘I have an obsession with uniforms,’ she explains. ‘I’m fascinated by the smartness and functionality of clothes.’ Which brands appeal to her? ‘Comme des Garçons, Simone Rocha – she really thinks of the body when she designs – Haider Ackermann, Balenciaga.’
‘I like it when style can make you change the way you move,’ she continues. ‘It’s almost
like a serum of strength. So if you’re feeling down, you wear something heavier to make you sit and feel your body more.’ When it comes to shoes, she loves Céline flats for their combined masculinity and femininity, and relies on Fendi for high heels: ‘I’m 160cm. Very short!’ She also has access to the fabulous Fendi archive in Rome, and has been known to borrow items including the fur coats worn by Gwyneth Paltrow in The Royal Tenenbaums, and by Madonna in Evita. ‘They’re incredible,’ she says. ‘It’s like wearing a piece of history.’ A history that Delettrez too will one day be a part of, in her own inimitable way.