PARIS — With rope pulls and sweatshirt collars, stripes and membership badges, fast release-style clasps and carbon fiber, there’s a sporty vibe to the most recent Chanel excessive jewellery assortment unveiled Tuesday in Monaco.
And its “Haute Joaillerie Sport” moniker dispels any doubt on its theme.
However don’t make a reference to the looming 2024 Paris Olympics: so far as the French model is worried, there isn’t one.
“To create the ‘Sport’ excessive jewellery assortment, I used to be impressed by Chanel’s sporty type, which is such an integral a part of the home’s historical past: the magnificence of the road and the liberty of motion,” acknowledged Patrice Leguéreau, director of the Chanel jewellery creation studio.
Gabrielle Chanel had embraced physique consciousness and freedom of motion as early as 1921, utilizing jersey for daytime leisurewear, making a “Sport” atelier in her couture home and even creating devoted cosmetics.
All through out her profession, this could proceed to be a serious throughline of the Chanel type vernacular.
This Graphic Line necklace.
Courtesy of Chanel
Plus, had it not been for the COVID-19 pandemic, this sports-themed excessive jewellery assortment would have possible been unveiled in 2023, insisted the French home’s president of watches and jewellery Frédéric Grangié.
“So far as we’re involved, the origins of the gathering had been set down years in the past, as we had been creating the triptych with Tweed, Numéro Cinq and Bijoux de Diamant’s ninetieth anniversary,” he mentioned. “All the things brings us again to Gabrielle Chanel and Patrice [Leguéreau] seemed on the truth that she created a sports activities division in 1921, a world first in a couture home.”
Exhibiting in Monaco leaned additional into this concept, given the principality’s place as “a 2.2 sq. kilometer focus of our shared historical past and of sports activities, with tennis, System 1 and seashore [activities]” as Grangié put it.
Shortly after launching her sports activities line and the No.5 fragrance, the couturier opened a counter on the Hôtel de Paris in 1926. The model has since held quite a few occasions, together with its 2023 cruise assortment.
Aesthetics-wise, the concept of a physique in movement had Légereau hewing nearer to the physique, in line with the concept of sportswear and streamlined design.
All through the six chapters of the gathering, he alighted on clear contours, tapering volumes, utilizing motifs impressed by motion whereas doubling down on model signifiers such because the quantity 5, the two.55 purse’s turnlock and, for the primary time, the Chanel brand.
Changed into a design characteristic, the letters within the Chanel brand tumble throughout the floor of the Chanel Print cuff bracelet, which includes a white gold lattice nodding to mesh materials.
This transformable piece comes with a further set of cuff halves in black which known as for an additional first, molded carbon fiber. This materials been used for something for sailboats and spacecrafts to fishing rods and prosthetics units, however by no means in excessive jewellery.
The Chanel Print cuff.
Courtesy of Chanel
The cuff was reportedly snapped up in 20 minutes, by the primary consumer who seen it by way of a digital appointment.
“What more and more makes a distinction is the artistic and authentic aspect of a group,” Grangié mentioned. “As a result of at this stage — with the best stage of workmanship and stones as a given — having designs which might be atypical, distinctive however actually the essence of the model could also be what triggers [a purchase] for purchasers.”
Amidst the continued luxurious slowdown, Grangié mentioned that whereas lowered site visitors was as a lot a priority for Chanel as for its rivals, notably in outstanding markets like China and the U.S., the Rue Cambon home wasn’t fazed by such cycles.
“For a monetary analyst, it’s in regards to the quarter or the yr. That isn’t the case for us,” he continued. “What characterizes and makes the great thing about excessive jewellery is that we’re writing a narrative as we speak that’s a narrative for the following 10, 20, 50 years.”
The Graphic Line ring that includes a 17.18-carat Kashmir sapphire.
Courtesy of Chanel
That mentioned, he named the rising consumer confidence in Chanel’s excessive jewellery in addition to novel designs rooted in Chanel’s codes as success components for the division. “It’s an exercise that overperformed in 2023 and continues to carry out very, very nicely in 2024,” he added.
Distilled in an 80-piece assortment, Leguéreau’s sport inspiration become 18 necklaces, 16 earrings and a minimum of 33 rings in addition to bracelets, brooches and a jewellery watch.
Modularity and adjustable items — over 1 / 4 of the lineup — are par for the course, in an additional nod to Gabrielle Chanel. “My jewellery might be remodeled as a result of my attire change.…This already existed however I wished to excellent it and construct on it,” she advised French journalist Albert Flament in a 1932 interview, following the “Bijoux de Diamants” launch.
Working example, a white gold necklace that includes a snap hook formed just like the quantity 5 from the Sporty 5 Status chapter that comes as a set with a pair of asymmetrical earrings. Completely different pendants might be swapped round for at the least three totally different mixtures.
On one other necklace within the set, the pendant that includes a ten.24-carat emerald set in an oval body that may be folded into as a cocktail ring, additionally revealing a quantity 5 when seen from the aspect.
The Sporty 5 necklace options the tubular chain design and a snap hook-inspired design — and diamonds.
Courtesy of Chanel
“There are two complementary provides on this assortment,” he mentioned. With 23 distinctive items and greater than 40 % of the designs are priced larger than 1,000,000 euros, a part of the gathering is supposed to talk to purchasers looking for funding items, usually with essential stones.
“They know all the most important homes and these homes are competing for these purchasers, so chatting with them requires the excessive stage of workmanship, probably the most stunning gems on this planet and in our case, complete artistic freedom,” he continued.
What may catch their consideration at Chanel is a set of 5 Kashmir sapphires that took over seven years to assemble, with the primary stone present in 2017.
One 17.18-carat specimen is the centerpiece of the Graphic Line ring, which comes with a removable jacket aspect and is priced at 9.5 million euros.
One other sits on the theme’s necklace, a masterpiece within the assortment that required 1,700 hours of labor. It’s formed like a fold-over collar outlined in rubies in a chevron sample, and tapers right into a closure impressed by the one on the two.55 purse.
The opposite sort of consumer Grangié described is one who will probably be charmed by the novelty of this sports-inspired line, with designs together with a double-finger ring with scoreboard lettering spelling No.5 or a collar necklace completed with two yellow-gold rope pulls, a tubular chain design that’s yet one more innovation from the excessive jewellery workshop.
“Right here we’re nearly on impulse buys as a result of [the designs] are cool, enjoyable and you recognize you’re the one one to put on such a chunk — that’s one thing they actually prize,” the manager mentioned.
Past the person attraction of those items, he was eager to focus on its place in excessive jewellery historical past with its sports activities theme but additionally in Chanel lore.
“All the things brings us again to 1932 and the primary artistic gesture of Chanel. Bijoux de Diamant was her assortment and we’re writing every thing else,” he mentioned. “It gained’t attraction to all of the purchasers I discussed however it’s definitely each enticing to see creation, novelty and inform your self that you’ve tomorrow’s patrimony in entrance of you and that’s additionally our actual distinction.”
Hidden Treasures
Last addition within the in depth renovation of Chanel’s watch and jewellery flagship retailer on Place Vendôme is the house devoted to the French model’s patrimonial archive.
Some 800 items of bijou and watchmaking have been collected right here, spanning the early days of her model to creations of Patrice Leguéreau, director of the nice jewellery creation studio, and Arnaud Chastaingt, director of the Chanel watchmaking creation studio.
“Bijoux de Diamants” exhibition held within the Chanel watches and nice jewellery patrimony room.
Courtesy of Chanel
Among the many highlights are 39 items of bijou created by Gabrielle Chanel herself, together with the only star-shaped brooch from the then-controversial Bijoux de Diamants launched in 1932.
Since 2012, the home selects items from every assortment for its archive. Latest additions embrace the distinctive 55.55 necklace created to mark the centenary of the No.5 fragrance, and a replica of Tweed Couture plastron from the 2020 excessive jewellery creation.
Examples of the Chanel Première, J12 and different timekeepers comparable to gem-set Mademoiselle Privé or a desk clock that includes a lion on a rock crystal base.
Desk clock that includes a lion in 18-karat yellow gold, rock crystal, onyx and greater than 1,300 brilliant-cut diamonds.
Courtesy of Chanel
There are additionally paperwork, bejeweled cigarette instances and holders in addition to the sword of American French conductor and harpsichordist William Christie, created for his entry on the Académie des Beaux-Arts.
Whereas the patrimonial assortment is just not open to the general public, its items are sometimes on mortgage to museums for exhibitions — on Chanel or not.