The French jewelry house is distinguished by a special poetic view of the Universe and everything that happens in it. The new Sous les etoiles (“Under the stars”) jewels turn our dreams to the starry sky and beyond. At the same time, the most romantic inspiration for Van Cleef & Arpels draws on specific sources - from Lucian of Samosata, the first science fiction writer who sent his hero on a flight to the moon, to scientific treatises of the discoverer of the laws of planetary motion, Johannes Keppler, from Popular Astronomy by Camille Flammarion (1880) to modern NASA imagery.
In the history of the jewelry house, the theme of heavenly bodies does not take the last place: here you can recall the star brooch with pearls of 1907, the minaudiere with the crescent-shaped lock (1934), meteorite earrings (1956), and a gold pendant with an imitation of the lunar surface (1969).
Lune brooch, Van Cleef & Arpels, 1969 © press service
Part of the Sous les etoiles collection was planned to be shown in Paris last summer, but the premiere was postponed until better times, and now they are showing the complete collection. Each of the 150 pieces of jewelry is an interpretation of a wide variety of astronomical phenomena. There is also the Milky Way, imprinted in a ring with a sapphire cabochon (69.23 carats, Sri Lanka), and a lunar eclipse (asymmetric Eclipsis earrings with rubies or sapphires combined with diamonds), and Halley's comet - in its Halley necklace its rapid movement conveys a yellow pear-shaped diamond against a background of snow-white pavé, and the planet Saturn in the form of a brooch with diamond rings.
Chalcedony cabochons in the Cepheid necklace create the effect of twinkling Cepheid stars, while the flat Ciel de Minuit choker made of lapis lazuli fragments interspersed with diamonds symbolizes the starry sky. And of course, the house of Van Cleef & Arpels could not do without brooches-figurines of fairies and ballerinas. But in a cosmic context, they appear in the form of heavenly patrons, such as the goddess of the planet Mercury or the fairy Cassiopeia.
1 of 13 Saturne brooch © press service Doubles galaxies brooch with purple sapphire © press service Ciel de minuit necklace © press service Fee Cassiopee brooch © press service Deesse Mercure brooch © press service Mosaique d'etoiles brooch © press service Cepheide necklace with detachable brooch pendant © press service Galaxie tourbillon brooch © press service Equinoxe brooch © press service Eclipsis earrings with rubies and diamonds © press service Eclipsis earrings with sapphires and diamonds © press service Helios transformable necklace © press - Helios Transforming Tiara Service
For the space symphony of Van Cleef & Arpels, excellent gemological samples were selected: a yellow sapphire (50.38 carats, Sri Lanka) in a Helios necklace, a pair of sapphire octagons with a total weight of over 50 carats in a Tresor Astral necklace, a blue cushion-cut sapphire (40, 52 carats, Madagascar) in the Flammes de Neptune ring.
