“I used my penchant for all that shines to try and reconcile elegance and fashion in a set of jewelry,” Gabrielle (aka Coco) Chanel once said. And infuse jewels with elegance and fashion is exactly what she did. In 1932, she unveiled her very first collection of diamond jewelry, Bijoux de Diamants, most pieces of which most have been lost or reconstructed over time. But now, Chanel Haute Joaillerie (Thames & Hudson) is retracing history from Chanel’s first high jewelry collection designed by Coco herself through the following nine decades to today.
The tome incorporates not only one-of-a-kind jewels (including a necklace with an octagonal diamond weighing precisely 55.55 carats), but also work from legendary photographers through the ages: Karl Lagerfeld, Mario Testino, Patrick Demarchelier, and Horst P. Horst, among them. Even more, it discloses archival illustrations and sketches that offer a behind-the-scenes glimpse at the making of a high jewelry collection by none other than the iconic Chanel.
Organized in sections—the origins, the symbols, the spirit, and the allure—the book offers a comprehensive narrative of both Chanel’s past and future, and how it’s lived up to its original vision of elegance and refinement within fashion. Chanel Haute Joaillerie concludes, in true Chanel fashion, not with the closing of a chapter by the beginning of a new one: its latest high jewelry collection by the director of Chanel’s fine jewelry creation studio, Patrice Leguéreau. Aptly named 1932, the collection infuses elements of Coco Chanel’s first high jewelry collection with contemporary thinking.
Debuting in France and the United Kingdom this month, and China, Japan, and Korea in January 2023, Chanel Haute Joaillerie will be available in the United States in March 2023.
Top: Chanel’s new 528-page book, Chanel Haute Joaillerie (Thames & Hudson, $200), highlights all of the house’s high jewelry collections over 90 years (photos courtesy of Chanel).
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