Plus Van Cleef & Arpels’ new diamonds and Bulgari coins its Monete collection
Words by ELIZABETH VARNELL
Designers TIFFANY & CO. Botanica 2022 Blue Book Collection platinum pendant with diamonds and an unenhanced sapphire of over 38 carats, price upon request.
Blooming Bijoux
Inspired by the sculptural beauty of all flora, Tiffany & Co.’s high-jewelry Blue Book Collection for 2022, Botanica, is capping off the year with one final installment that takes the form of wisteria, magnolias and orchids. The addition includes a bevy of transformable jewels and updated Jean Schlumberger works re-creating nature’s bounty through diamonds, colored gemstones and Tiffany’s quintessential savoir faire. The collection is an archival deep dive that delves far beyond the house’s trove of heritage jewelry to incorporate several of the company’s defining moments.
The late Art Nouveau artist and designer Louis Comfort Tiffany’s most beloved works, including a 1901 leaded glass wisteria table lamp, introduce a painterly color palette picked up in wisteria necklaces, rings and earrings encrusted with subdued blue chalcedony and milky quartz stones—a translucent nod to the artistry of house founder Charles Lewis Tiffany’s son. Custom-cut diamonds and sapphires arranged in an ombré gradation amplify the theme and capture nature’s irregularities.
Designer John T. Curran’s vase depicting magnolias, made of silver, gold, enamel and opals and displayed at the 1893 Chicago World’s Fair, inspire a necklace comprised of milky quartz hand-carved into magnolia petals with pink sapphires and diamonds nestled around a 43-carat morganite stone. Platinum diamond earrings and rings fashioned around a red spinel or ruby are also among the metamorphosed magnolia-inspired designs.
The lines of G. Paulding Farnham’s fluidly shaped enamel orchid brooches—created for Paris’ 1889 Exposition Universelle—are echoed in the custom-cut diamond offerings evoking petal silhouettes in the Orchid Curve range. Naturally, modern Jean Schlumberger florals with unexpected gemstone pairings round out the garden-ready collection. tiffany.com.
VAN CLEEF & ARPELS Atours Mystérieux necklace from the Legend of Diamonds collection, price upon request.
Diamond Daze
Classic white diamonds are headlining this season at Van Cleef & Arpels. After acquiring a rough stone, the traceably mined Lesotho Legend, the French house endeavored to create a complete collection around it named the Legend of Diamonds. The resulting pieces showcase a technique called the Mystery Set, wherein grooved stones slide onto their settings, reversing the traditional method of gem-setting with visible metal prongs. Jewelers, setters, lapidaries and polishers—the mains d’or (French for “hands of gold”)—spent more than 30,000 hours throughout four years finishing the gems with the aid of 3D software. The initial stone was carefully cut into 67 diamonds, which were used to create 25 stunning, versatile designs. What’s more, Van Cleef & Arpels also has a second high-jewelry offering: White Diamond Variations comprises 82 designs that update house themes from the last century. vancleefarpels.com.
AMANDA GORMAN wears PRADA Eternal Gold drop earrings, price upon request.
Gold Standard
Finding modern, sustainable uses for existing materials is one way Prada continues to innovate. Case in point: its trademark nylon bags composed of reworked Re-Nylon, an initiative that launched in 2019. Now the century-old Italian fashion house is launching fine jewelry created entirely of certified recycled gold. The debut Eternal Gold collection presents necklaces, earrings, rings and bracelets created with precious metals from traceable sources verified by the Aura Blockchain Consortium, a platform which documents the authenticity of luxury goods. The brand’s first foray into fine jewelry takes inspiration from the Prada triangle, the now ubiquitous logo initially used by house founder Mario Prada. Resulting designs include a pair of puffed angular earrings, a snake bracelet with a triangular head, a heart necklace, earrings with angular points and even a super-sized choker with asymmetrical chain links, all riffing on the theme. prada.com.
BULGARI 50th Anniversary Monte necklace with Roman coin and pave diamonds, price upon request.
Coin Operated
Among Bulgari’s most enduring emblems, ancient Greek and Roman currency are symbolic of the jeweler’s roots; the house was founded in Rome by a Greek silversmith. In celebration of the house’s arrival in America, the motifs have re-emerged in a trove of new yellow-gold Monete pieces commemorating the brand’s 50 years across the Atlantic. Coin collector Nicola Bulgari created the designs in the 1960s and ’70s, and the new line is inspired by his archival pieces individually mounted and worn by Elizabeth Taylor, Cher and Grace Kelly. Each coin is rare and unique, whether set in high-jewelry necklaces and bracelets or in fine sautoirs, gourmette chains, flip rings, tuboga cuffs and double coil bracelets. Contrasting hues of modern polished gold surrounding antique bronze or silver, a hallmark of the originals, look just as bold today. bulgari.com.
HARRY WINSTON Precious Emerald timpiece, price upon request.
Emerald City
Referencing Harry Winston’s fondness for octagonal silhouettes, the house’s new high jewelry watch collection is also a master class in diamond cuts. The petite-sized Precious Emerald tickers evoke the delicate look and flexibility of platinum tennis bracelets but are set with 146 brilliant- and marquise-cut diamonds, closed with a hidden clasp. Emerald-shaped watch faces are made with iridescent mother-of-pearl and groupings of 10 marquise diamonds form fan shapes positioned at 5 and 10 o’clock, re-creating the house’s cluster motif developed in the 1940s. Beyond white mother-of-pearl, the watch face is available in pink, red, green, yellow and two different shades of blue. Implicit in the minimalist dial, limited to hour and minute hands, is a promise to get a bride and her attendants to the ceremony on time. 310 N. Rodeo Dr., B.H., 310-271-8554; 200 Post St., S.F., 628-867-1100; harrywinston.com.
DAVID WEBB Artful Animals Kingdom frog brooch with diamonds, $22,000.
Animal Kingdom
The designs of David Webb’s Artful Animal collection—including enamel horse, zebra and giraffe bracelets, leopard brooches and coiled snake cuffs—are elegant additions to a modern trousseau, particularly for ceremonies held in shaded gardens and coastal woods. Webb designed the creatures at his desk in New York surrounded by leafy plants, drawing on the Ashville, North Carolina, hills of his upbringing as inspiration. A 1967 Vogue profile once described his apartment as “two-thirds garden, one-third living quarters,” and Webb had commissioned a 1964 film, A Walk in the Woods, which the house recently re-created, to show the jewels in verdant environs. Naturally, tiny gold and bejeweled frog brooches perched on floating leaves are a mood to build a wedding around. 9500 Wilshire Blvd., Beverly Hills, 310-858-8006; davidwebb.com.
Feature image: PRADA Eternal Gold pendant necklace, price upon request.
Portions of this story originally appeared in the Winter 2022 issue of C Magazine.
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