Jewellery created by Sicis conquers New York, Paris, Dubai and Geneva

A new showroom in Dubai's design district. The expanded and enhanced Parisian 'home' in the golden fashion triangle of Rue Marbeuf. Construction sites on Fifth Avenue advancing to debut in New York in early 2026. And in the meantime three new jewellery collections with and without micromosaic ready to be launched at the Geneva show in 2025. Sicis Jewels continues its path of growth on international markets, which are worth 95% of its sales, concentrating on mixing with wisdom and patience in its collections the ancient mosaic art of Ravenna and the skill acquired by its master craftsmen in working not only tesserae but precious metals and precious pearls, now also offering jewellery without micromosaic. "We cannot reveal the names yet, but in Geneva we will present three new collections that will have the same concept as Giardino, i.e. jewellery in the 'easy' version with coloured pearls but without micromosaics, which is closer to western tastes, and the 'high' range with micromosaics, from 30 thousand euro upwards, which continues to be the favourite of our historic clientele," anticipates Gioia Placuzzi, the founder and head of the Jewels division of Sicis, the pocket-sized multinational founded by her father Maurizio Leo in 1987 in Ravenna, the Byzantine cradle of mosaic art, which has been able to reinterpret the technique of the ancient Romans in a contemporary key, transforming it into floor and wall coverings and then high-end jewellery appreciated by Asian, Arab and American millionaires.

These are the three markets that Sicis is betting on for next year, all the more so after the closure of the Russian market and the move of many super-rich from Moscow to Dubai. "It is precisely in Dubai, which we have presided over for the past thirteen years through an office on the first floor in the design district, that we plan to inaugurate a new showroom by next April, about 400 square metres of full-concept space," says Gioia Placuzzi, creative director and chief operating officer of the family's "art mosaic factory", "where we will present our entire range, from mosaics to jewellery. We have also moved our Paris showroom, enlarged and embellished in a more visible corner location on Rue Marbeuf, the official opening will be in January 2025. While work continues overseas on Fifth Avenue, but more slowly than planned, so we have postponed the opening until 2026. The American market is exploding, especially in the very high-end, also thanks to the collaboration started in the United States with is with Neiman Marcus, the chain specialising in luxury retail, the last month has been a riot of trunk shows by retailers'.

The United States, which has come to be worth 17% of Sicis business (€50 million in total last year, of which jewellery is a niche), is compensating for the weakness of Chinese demand, "but in a luxury market that is suffering, we continue to grow between 8 and 10% this year, a trend that we expect to maintain in 2025, thanks to an optimal presence and commercial set-up on the different continents, including shops in Milan, Paris, London, Hong Kong, Dubai and the imminent arrival in New York," anticipates the second generation of the Placuzzi family, which has begun to reason about a possible debut on the stock exchange to fuel capitalisation and thus growth, aiming to double turnover in three years.

Enclosing the success of Sicis Jewels are the skilful hands of some twenty master craftsmen, who set by hand, one by one, microscopic glass paste tesserae (which do not reach a millimetre per side) melted at 1,400 degrees and transformed into works of art inspired by nature and animals. "We have about a hundred masters here in Ravenna, between traditional mosaic and micromosaic, one third of whom are interchangeable, but the issue of training new artisans has become crucial to ensure the future of Sicis," concludes Placuzzi. "We are unique in the world and we are working with the Art School and the Academy of Fine Arts and we are optimistic, because the interest of young people is there. We opened our workshop-factory during the autumn Fai days and after an hour there were so many people and so many bookings that we had to close the slots'.