IN FULL BLOOM: When Van Cleef & Arpels scooped up a Grand Prize on the 1925 Worldwide Exhibition of Trendy Ornamental and Industrial Arts, the home of Alfred Van Cleef and Estelle Arpels was a rising signature in jewellery that was lower than twenty years previous.
Now a grande dame of Place Vendôme, it retraces its deep Artwork Deco hyperlinks and 100-and-some years historical past and with an exhibition working till Jan. 18 on the Tokyo Metropolitan Teien Artwork Museum — itself an architectural jewel of the motion, inbuilt 1933 after Prince and Princess Asaka, members of the Japanese imperial household, returned from Paris and the Exhibition.
The Entwined Flowers, Purple and White Roses bracelet from 1924
Courtesy of Van Cleef & Arpels
Articulated in 4 chapters unfold all through some 25,000 sq. toes throughout the museum’s predominant constructing and annex, there are 250 items of bijou, timepieces and treasured objects drawn from the jeweler’s patrimonial assortment and personal ones, and 60 gadgets from its archives.
Among the many items to not be missed are the prize-winning 1924 Entwined Flowers, Purple and White Roses excessive jewellery bracelet that was among the many designs that earned Van Cleef & Arpels the Grand Prize on the 1925 exhibition; and a Camellia Minaudière from 1938 with a removable floral clasp that could possibly be worn as a brooch and primarily based on a 1933 patented design for a case holding a mirror, lipstick, powder compact, cigarette lighter, pocket book and extra mandatory gadgets for night outings. There’s additionally the Chrystanthemum brooch, which options the thriller setting method, invented in 1933 and patented in 1937.
