During January’s Haute Couture shows, globally renowned jewellers and a slew of fashion houses present high jewellery collections to the fash pack as well as exclusive clientele. Many of the collections shown last week revisited house codes, revisiting archives to fuel enormous feats of creativity and craftsmanship. Here, we round up the crème de la crème of this season’s high jewellery collections, daring you to dream.
Dior: Chiffre Rouge
Photography by Thue Nørgaard
Dior’s Chiffre Rouge watch collection, which first landed on the luxury market 20 years ago, entered into a renaissance during Haute Couture Week. The exceptional timepiece has always been architecturally asymmetrical, and here, in eight, reinvented models (a homage to Monsieur Dior’s favourite number, eight), and two sizes, its red crown case is engraved with the lines of the house’s quintessential cannage and comes bedecked with exquisite stones or distinguished by an ultra-matte black. The hands are red too, and the option to interchange the straps between precious leather or rubber cannage (macro or micro) allows the offering to suit all tastes. Visible on the back face of the watch is an automatic mechanism, transparently displaying the exceptional savoir-faire of the various calibres it’s fitted with, from chronograph to tourbillon. ‘8’ is also the only numeral on the date display to be highlighted with the same vibrant shade of red as the case. Five of the Dior Chiffre Rouge watches will be available in boutiques from February 12, 2024, one from July 2024 and the last two from October 2024.
Dior: Dior Délicat
Applying the same, considered principles of its gracefully feminine haute couture collection to an incredible 79-piece high jewellery range. Dubbed Dior Délicat, artistic director of Dior Jewellery, Victoire de Castellane, deploys her singular aesthetic to what the house describes as an “unprecedented” collection wherein the pieces hug the body and undulate over it like bespoke fabric.
Marrying the motifs of the Galons Dior and Dearest Dior high jewellery lines, Dior Délicat is “infinitely combinable” and includes rings, bracelets, necklaces and earrings. There’s an interplay of geometry and asymmetry, realised through the application of the highest quality rubies, emeralds, blue sapphires, rubellites and tanzanites. One white gold parure in particular, punctuated with pique diamonds and botanical details, pays subtle tribute to Monsieur Dior and his unfailing adoration for nature.
The name of the collection isn’t just an alliteration or play on words, it’s an accurate descriptor – the treasures emulate the particular delicacy of embroidery and finesse and lightness of lace.
Repossi: Serti Sur Vide
10 years ago, Repossi debuted its Serti Sur Vide collection, an avant garde assortment of jewellery that prides itself on the art of illusion. Drawing the eye to its pear-shaped centre stones and away from the bezel settings using a signature ‘Eiffel Tower’ technique, the solitaire stone appears to levitate or float and the setting is rendered invisible.
11 technically innovative pieces were unveiled during the couture season in the first chapter of this Serti Sur Vide revival, many of which revisit the collection’s foundational principles and honour neo-worn pieces, carefully curated from the house’s archives. Among minimalist diamonds and emeralds applied to earrings, bracelets and rings, a “tie” necklace by creative director Gaia Repossi is the crowd puller. Developed as a tribute to the renowned necklace of the same design that Alberto Repossi created in 2000, it features white gold paved with diamonds and set with a pear-shaped emerald. The second chapter of Serti Sur Vide is set to debut in June and will consist of six contemporary pieces. Watch this space.
Chaumet: Un Air de Chaumet
For over 240 years, Chaumet has nurtured an intimate relationship with nature, weaving decadent objects of desire from flowered branches, abysmal oceans and of course, aerial animals. Repeatedly reinventing its signature aesthetic, the maison, appointed by Joséphine Bonaparte (Empress of the French, wife of Napoleon and later queen of Italy) as “official jeweller to the Empress”, has long shared in the sovereign’s fascination with birds, from which this collection stems.
Its latest high jewellery capsule unveiled during couture week, is conceived in four “movements” composed as duos of inherently light, elementary pieces. The collection is melodically named Un Air de Chaumet, and so it looks to the skies, depicting the sky-slicing flight of kingfishers, swallows and other birds in plumage-like parures, transformable hair ornaments, brooches and earrings.
Louis Vuitton: Deep Time II
Continuing the epic journey of Louis Vuitton’s Deep Time High Jewellery collection, comes Deep Time II, a 50-piece high jewellery collection – and the fifth to be designed by Francesca Amfitheatrof – that pays homage to the intricate geology of the Earth. Lapsing back to a time when our planet was populated by two supercontinents, Gondwana and Laurasia, the first object of desire is named for the latter and unites yellow diamonds with platinum, yellow and pink gold. The seven-row masterpiece necklace is punctuated by the house’s signature LV motif and as the most valuable jewel of the chapter, required 2,465 hours to create.
A seismic disruption of the tectonic plates informs Drift, which the maison describes as “a new dawn of life”. It utilises octagonal step-cut golden yellow sapphires and white gold. Myriad then examines the multiplication of cells, delivering DNA-like jewels and futuristic double-helix formations formed from supple white gold and LV Monogram Star cut diamonds. Segueing into Symbiosis, pastel pink and purple spinels are inspired by the Earth’s first land-bound ecosystems, namely fungi and mycelium. Additional themes include Fossils, Plants, Skin, Bones, Seeds and Flower, all of which include medleys of tiny details and exotic rocks sourced from places like Tahiti, Zambia, Paraiba and Australia.
It’s a magnificent odyssey through the evolution of life. Amfitheatrof says, “At Louis Vuitton we are as ever adventurers, travelling to extraordinary, unexpected places.”
Bucheron: The Power of Couture
Consisting of eight multi-wear parures built from 24 individual pieces, Boucheron’s latest high jewellery offering, aptly named The Power of Couture, is a truly arresting collection. Revisiting the couture heritage of the house’s founder, Frederic Boucheron, ceremonial attire was the point of departure for creative director Claire Choisne. Through an ingenious application of rock crystal and diamonds, the substance of the jewellery is the focus, but Choisne doesn’t compromise on style. Adhering to a high-brow monochrome theme, rich with medals, buttons, embroideries and aiguillettes ornamented with white gold, rock crystal and diamonds, the baroque character of traditionally gold-tone decorations is tempered, lightening up the treasures with ease.
GRAFF
Graff’s brilliantly graphic high jewellery collection hasn’t been bestowed a name, but perhaps this is because the enchanting creations do all the talking. With each diamond, ruby, Columbian emerald and sapphire meticulously set into place by the brand’s highly-accomplished diamond setters in London, lines are abstract, arrangements are bold and asymmetrical as the maison does away with excess.
Featuring necklaces, earrings, bracelets and solitaire rings, two distinctly delicate pieces stand out. The first is an ovular white diamond Bird Ring which depicts a bird curling around its wings and tightly cradling the central stone. It symbolises new beginnings. The second is a diamond bangle featuring an extraordinary 118 carat cushion cut unheated Sri Lankan sapphire. The centre stone is surrounded by over 39 carats of round and fancy-cut diamonds – with each precious stone set into a faceted arrangement of diamonds that wrap around the wrist.
CARTIER: Le Voyage Recommencé
The new, Cartier Le Voyage Recommencé high jewellery collection by Jacqueline Karachi, director of high jewellery creation, truly exemplifies the maison’s insatiable taste for curiosity. Tapping into a creative tension that dances from hyper-realism to abstraction and exquisite stylisation, five alluring pieces are included. The Yfalos necklace looks toward the sea as an extension of the sky, using turquoise cabochons – one azure, the other streaked with brown – for the central pendants before descending into a set of ribbed coral and turquoise beads and emeralds. The Panthère Confiante Necklace – part of the Cartier menagerie since 1914 – is reborn in peridot, diamonds and onyx injected with vivid colours and graphic touches reminiscent of feline fur. While the Pileo Ring is inspired by sea urchins and bristles with rose-cut and brilliant-cut diamonds and white gold studs, the Lerro Necklace bears three octagonal Colombian emeralds that are exasperated by a light monochrome diamond composition. Among the offerings, the Spina Necklace stands out. Constructed through broken lines, alternating cushion-cut diamonds, Sri Lankan sapphires and openwork, when pivoted on itself, the curvature reverses and it transforms into a tiara mounted on a special frame. Cartier never fails to impress.
Giorgio Armani Privé Haute Joaillerie
Giorgio Armani Privé sees jewellery as more than just an accessory, but rather, part of the wearer. And so, tapping into a freedom and desire that knows no restraint, the house’s master goldsmiths apply an “unusual, free and elegant” use of gems across invisible settings for its latest high jewellery range. Craftspeople simplify the precise geometry of lines, in turn creating unexpected pavé motifs, drawing attention to the gems, and the gems alone. The result is minimal and discreet, and the precious stones appear to become one with the wearer without skimping on the expressive opulence expected from a couture collection.
The blue parure series – the first of three – is decked with intoxicating sapphires, diamonds and white gold. The green grouping arrives next and is built from passels of tsavorites and diamonds paired with yellow gold. Deeply seductive, the red selection combines rubies, diamonds and rose gold – all of the highest quality. Each series includes round lobe and pendant earrings, a necklace, a bracelet, a ring and a brooch. It’d be remiss not to mention that the necklace – the paragon piece – features a removable pendant, providing the house’s high brow clientele the option to wear it in whatever way they desire.
De Beers: Forces of Nature
Inspired by the ferocity of Mother Nature, De Beers latest high jewellery offering highlights a series of sculptural solitaire rings. Each is named after a southern African animal – the Giraffe, Lion, Buffalo, Zebra, Elephant, Rhinoceros, Leopard and Greater Kudu – as an ode to the region which the brand holds so close to its heart and the creatures it strives to protect with its Building Forever blueprint (which bids to create a positive and sustainable impact). There are eight total – each with an accompanying crown or jacket to enhance its already wondrous form – all of which place an incredibly rare hero diamond, selected for its “singular beauty and individual character”, on a pedestal.
Top Image: photography courtesy of Boucheron.