Text: Anna Pavlova VAN CLEEF & ARPELS JEWELRY HOUSE LAUNCHES A NEW SEVEN SEAS COLLECTION DEDICATED TO SEVEN SEASONS. THE COLLECTION IS COMPLETE OF REFERENCES TO THE PAST AND HIDES IN MYSELF MANY MYSTERIES OF THE RENAISSANCE ERA.
Like all products made in Van Cleef & Arpels workshops on Place Vendome, the Seven Seas collection is an example of skillful work and the highest technology. However, this time, the House moved away from its usual practice and created something that did not quite fit into the usual framework. According to Nicolas Bo, president and CEO of Van Cleef & Arpels, Seven Seas embodies the idea of a “cruise collection,” similar to the fact that each year they produce fashion houses for traveling on yachts.
It all started with the very idea of seven seas: the imagination of designers was played out in earnest - here are the warm waters of Arabia and India with burning corals, and the icy depths of the Atlantic, and the secrets of Tauris washed by the Black Sea. According to Nicolas Bo, the main task was to be able to catch the mood of the Renaissance, when traveling there was as much imagination as reality.
“Two important points connect Van Cleef & Arpels’s home to the seas,” says Nicolas. “First, we wanted to catch the spirit of the fashion cruise collection - I really like that the jewelery created with such skill is designed to be worn in summer, on a yacht, under sail. Here you can give free rein to imagination, play with all shades of flowers and completely surrender to the inspiration that the sea will give you.
However, this idea is also based on business considerations that other Jewelry Houses can definitely support in the future. The new Van Cleef & Arpels collection paves the way for exclusive jewelry at affordable prices. "We want to convey the idea that high jewelry does not exist for 200 people around the world, but for many, many people."
The jewelry is truly amazing. Here is a tiny sea fairy lying on a chalcedony reef, and diamond and sapphire bubbles are tangled in her hair. But the measured sway of the sea in a bracelet resembling the turquoise lines of the surf; and the stunning black and white Rivage Noir Blanc bracelet is no less a poetic story about a journey through the Black Sea under the light of the full moon, told in pearls and metal. But this is not all - the collection includes dancing princesses in sparkling outfits, and noble animals. All of them are made in the same color palette and the same smooth lines - their joyful dance, playful and bright, like summer itself, embodies the spirit of the entire collection.
This collection is also an imaginary journey to distant fabulous shores, at a time when the romantic concept of "seven seas" meant all the oceans of the world; when for the British sailors "to cross the seven seas" meant an absolutely impossible task - to sail to the very end of the world (East Indies) and return back.
And as the sequence of tides is constant, one thing is clear - the desire of Van Cleef & Arpels to bring high jewelry back to reality, make it accessible and pay more attention to how jewelry looks on a living person, and not in a safe, can definitely become a new trend in the jewelry world.
