Endless circularity: a new lease of life for a vintage piece of jewellery
A masterpiece from the past, authenticated following meticulous archival research, restored and brought back onto the market by the very same house that created it. This is the essence of the Heritage collection.
It was utterly inappropriate, the height of social faux pas. A gesture like that and the lights of the most refined dinner party would suddenly go out on the culprit – for we are, of course, talking about women – and on the hosts, who were guilty in their own right. But what had that splendid lady done that was so wrong, sitting next to the ambassador of a fabulously wealthy Eastern country, who in turn was conversing with the latest Goncourt Prize winner, who had just whispered a jest into his companion’s ear? Nothing, if we think of today, but a horror a century ago: she had glanced at her watch, a clear sign that in that fairy-tale realm, chronological time had resumed its inexorable ticking.
In short, the lady was bored. And so the extraordinary craftsmen at Van Cleef & Arpels, those eyes, those skilled hands that have been making every gesture of ours precious since 1906, devised a little treasure chest of beauty where every woman could hide her tools of seduction and power: a lipstick, a mirror, a powder compact, a cigarette case, a lighter, a notebook with a pencil, a pillbox, and of course a watch. In an instant, the secret box would open and, hidden from prying eyes, everything was there, even time. And time—that profound gift of resisting the inexorable passage of the seasons and preserving the most authentic light intact—has always been one of the defining features of Van Cleef & Arpels’ style, both powerful and delicate. It is no coincidence that, in 2007, the renowned maison created Heritage, a collection that runs parallel to its new creations, offering a select clientele the masterpieces of a century of charm and savoir-faire.
Since 2013, these marvels have blossomed anew every year in a garden unlike any other in the world, Tefaf in Maastricht, a fair attended by the most important international galleries, the most prestigious institutions and the most discerning collectors. Here, in a stand that looked as though it had stepped out of a Persian miniature, amidst peacocks, leaves, flowers, trees, blue skies and little fanciful clouds, some forty pieces of jewellery and precious objects – heaven forbid we call them accessories – which retrace seven extraordinary decades of the Parisian maison, from the 1920s to the 1990s, with particular focus on the 1960s, a period so innovative in the history of art, women and their emancipation.
Small coincidences, just to set the scene for the Van Cleef & Arpels era: in 1963 – and this is one of the pieces on display – the maison’s workshops created a spectacular necklace in platinum and white gold, comprising two rows of baguette-cut and brilliant-cut diamonds, brought together in a central flower featuring round and oval diamonds, which could be transformed into a brooch, standing alone and exquisite even on a belt, a jacket or the shoulder of a dress. Three years later, in 1966, the house created the crown of Farah Pahlavi, the last Empress of Iran, and the crown is set with thirty-six emeralds – the central one weighing 105 carats – thirty-six rubies, one hundred and five pearls and 1,469 diamonds. Straddling these two creations lies another significant date, 13 July 1965, when French women first gained the right to open a bank account in their own name, and thus to hold a cheque book, and thus to withdraw money—whether from their own earnings or personal income—without needing to be accompanied by their spouse. Maria Callas, then proudly single, must have thoroughly enjoyed signing the cheque with which, in 1967, she purchased at 22 Place Vendôme—the address of Van Cleef & Arpels since 1906, the enchanting brooch Fleur à Cinq Feuilles, in platinum, rubies and diamonds.
The design that gave rise to this legendary brooch, the Divine One’s lucky charm, is still held in the maison’s archives today. And it is to these archives, like a living memory, that two other important women turn for their meticulous and essential research: Alexandrine Maviel-Sonet, director of heritage and exhibitions, and Natacha Vassiltchikov, director of high jewellery retail. It is she who tells HTSI the story behind each of the more than 150 jewels in the Heritage collection and, above all, the method used to certify the authenticity of the pieces. The method, as it happens, is once again time – the time of a very long love story, which began in 1895 with the marriage of Alfred Van Cleef, aged twenty-one, and Esther Arpels, known as Estelle, nineteen, and the time of documents jealously preserved in the archives, starting with a number engraved in the intimacy of each piece of jewellery that corresponds to a dossier, a register, a genealogy of clients – the only clues for establishing the authenticity and integrity of each masterpiece. ‘Strange to say, but it is only in the last forty years that vintage jewellery has returned to shine in its own right and is no longer used as a source of stones, unwisely destined for new settings,’ says Natacha Vassiltchikov. The search for written records is followed by cleaning and, where necessary, restoration in what the staff call the beauty salon, the workshops where everything comes to life—even a second life—and “where the maison’s artisans understand the delicate balance between what we can do and what we cannot do,” continues the director. The patina is the test of time, invaluable, and it goes hand in hand with another magical quality: wearability. Whether it ends up in the windows of Tefaf or on a small tray in the historic boutique, a Van Cleef & Arpels must continue to engage with the fashion of our time. Iconic, wearable, always contemporary: this is the spirit of Heritage.
