Chopard’s 2016 Red Carpet Collection
The worlds of haute joaillerie and the silver screen collide every year with wonderful, eye-catching results. We are talking about Chopard’s Red Carpet Collection unveiled each year at the Cannes Film Festival, which provides the brand a recurring opportunity to push beyond the limits of its haute joaillerie while expressing cherished values
The Red Carpet Collection, which is worn by world-renowned actresses on the famous steps of the Palais des Festivals, draws as much from the exceptional creativity of the Swiss-based Maison as on its expertise in the field of high jewellery.
Genesis
Luxury maison Chopard has served as Official Partner of the Cannes Film Festival since 1998, passionately showcasing the quintessence of glamour for eighteen years. The Red Carpet Collection resulting from this special partnership was introduced in 2007 to mark the 60th anniversary of the festival.
Intended to adorn stars for their red carpet appearances, these creations are the result of the creativity of Caroline Scheufele, Co-President and Creative Director of the brand, and take shape through a fascinating synergy between the various talents exercised within the House. Ancestral skills, cutting-edge techniques and well-documented research meet and mingle in attaining impressive heights of perfection and creativity.
Each year Chopard challenges itself to increase the number of unique jewellery pieces created to match the number of Festival editions to date; the number of creations that emerge from the workshop grows by one each year. So the 2016 edition of the Cannes festival will see the launch of 69 extraordinary creations inspired by women and their magnificent auras.
A colourful tribute to feminine grace
The 2016 collection sets the stage for flowing, supple, open-worked designs based on rounded shapes. Evoking veils or lacework that gently caress the skin, the collection pays tribute to the graceful, voluptuous charm of women and highlights their feminine beauty. This year’s collection focuses on the necklace – the ultimate ornament that accentuates the delicate lines of a décolletage and the silky softness of the skin, whether it is draped with a spectacular necklace with matching earrings featuring a merry dance of daffodil yellow and white pear-cut and brilliant-cut diamonds or a delightful choker with slender diamond-set scrolling motifs.
Alongside rubies, sapphires, diamonds and emeralds of exceptional cut and quality, these necklaces also reveal the most unexpected gems such as black opals, fire opals and sculpted jade, which enjoy their moment in the limelight. Testifying to this splendid range of colours is a superbly sensual tie-necklace composed of five rows of emerald beads hemmed by sapphires, rubellites, tsavorites, topazes and amethysts, setting the scene for a magnificent white opal.
Several creations also feature titanium, a solid yet light innovative material that ideally lends itself to majestic decors and atypical shapes. The use of this metal enables even more fanciful and daring touches in that it can be coloured in a wide range of hues, either vanishing beneath the finest setting of gems, or enhancing the radiance of the stones it holds. This alliance is admirably embodied in wide earrings inspired by a paisley motif and set with cabochon-cut sapphires, topazes as well as blue and orange sapphires.
Ethical luxury
It is often noticeable that luxury carries its own price – not only in terms of the actual money involved, but in terms of the strain on ecological resources or on the flora and the fauna or in terms of the ethics involved. The Chopard maison is cognisant of this dilemma and has reacted by changing its methods of sourcing and production to positively affect the world; the brand has been in the vanguard for change for some years now. Several Green Carpet creations gracing this collection feature stunning emeralds from Zambia and illustrate Chopard’s firmly rooted determination to combine ethics with aesthetics.
Initiated by Chopard at the 66th Cannes Film Festival, “The Journey to Sustainable Luxury”is designed to foster the development of responsible luxury. Since then, a Green Carpet capsule collection has found its place within the Red Carpet collection. The Green Carpet High Jewellery creations by Chopard are crafted exclusively with Fairmined-certified gold – meaning that the gold utilised in its making is guaranteed to have been mined and processed in compliance with environmental and ethical standards – and with diamonds sourced from the IGC group, which is certified by the RJC Code of Practices.
The appearance of coloured stones among the “sustainable” creations in the collection is a noteworthy development this year introduced under the guidance of Caroline Scheufele. Chopard has signed a unique partnership with the Gemfields group, a global leader in the mining of coloured stones. In an industry first, emeralds from Zambia will be fully validated by Eco-Age, a brand consultancy specialising in sustainable solutions and Chopard’s partner in delivering the Journey to Sustainable Luxury,through its Green Carpet Challenge (GCC) Principles of Sustainable Excellence. These gems are an example of international best practice in coloured gemstone mining, making an important contribution to the country’s sustainable development. For the first time, Chopard introduces responsible coloured gemstones in its Green Carpet Collection, thereby creating totally ethical and traceable creations associating emeralds and diamonds from an RJC-certified diamond trader and Fairmined 18-carat white gold.
Their peerless colours, their elegance and their delicacy make them one of Caroline Scheufele’s favourite stones. Designing around these precious emeralds, Caroline Scheufele has created an extremely elegant jewellery set composed of a ring, a necklace and earrings.
