For being one of the most powerful persons in the watch and jewellery design world, Marie-Laure Cérède, the creative director of watches and jewellery at Cartier, is disarmingly soft-spoken. When we meet in Geneva, with a tray or two between us of some of the maison’s most interesting new watches for the year, it’s her almost-whispered diction that makes the strongest impression.
Things like a “sacred dimension” of design, the esoterica of magic and emotion that a Cartier creation should induce, the “living architecture” of a 3D object worn on a wrist. I had planned, originally, to ask Cérède firmer, classical questions. Describe your creative vision, how do you revamp decades and century-old icons, et cetera. But I quickly realised the fact of the individual I had in front of me. The rare treat of an aesthete who is tuned into the arcane matters of taste. So, a shift—to tap into the creative language of a person whose sensitivity to beauty inspires the kind of desire which has lifted Cartier watches into an echelon of its own.
Cartier describes its collection for the year as the art of metamorphosis and the maison compares itself to a magician. How would you characterise Cartier’s magic?
For me, magic at Cartier is more esoteric. There is a sacred dimension, I would say. Like on a precious stone, there is something special like a soul. I need to bring something more because we don’t need to wear a watch. Why would the younger generation buy a watch? It’s no longer functional or necessary, in a way, so it has to become a wish. There is something meaningful when it makes a statement of beauty.
You’ve remastered a number of Cartier’s heritage watch collections, like the Tank and Santos. How can you tell if something is right for the modern day?
This is a very hard question to address because there is a path of intuition. Intuition is very, very important. But if I were trying to rationalise, in terms of design, it’s not only what you see but also what you feel on your wrist. Translating a design into a contemporary version is making it very easy to wear and very comfortable like a second skin. Having a watch today should mean having something you don’t feel. All the work we’re doing on the details and volumes is not immediately visible.
The invisible details?
Invisible details. And there are so many. If you look at this [Tressage], there is a continuation of the smooth torsade on the back. It’s precious, even if you don’t see it from the front. But it’s yours, so it’s very smooth when you have it in hand and touch it.
The Tressage is not, strictly speaking, just either a watch or piece of jewellery. How do you think about hybrids like these?
It’s a fourth edition for me, this one, of a new road for the maison. You remember the Maillon, Clash [Un]limited and last year’s Reflection. For me, there is this categorisation of watches for ladies which is, on one hand, classic watches with only the strap and on the other, jewels integrating a movement that tells the time. So what else can we do? I was thinking, really, how can we have a jewellery watch on two leather straps? It has to remain a watch before everything, but not the watch of everybody.
Talk us through the creative process for the Tressage.
We have a very simple creative recipe on this. We looked at the Tank. I was thinking: first we elongate the lugs, and second, we oversize them. And we make this torsade— very known to our heritage, there are so many vintage pieces with this—and at the end, it becomes a semi-bangle watch. You have to see it on the wrist because it’s more an accessory and no more, really, a watch. It was quite free in terms of creation, but the complexity for us was… We didn’t think about this before, stupid, but how can we have a universal size for every wrist? The angles, the curves, are very important, and we worked a lot on the volumes to get one size for small and big wrists. We did maybe 40 volumes before getting the right one.
Is it more mathematical or intuitive, trying to get this universal volume?
It is both. You cannot know before. Mathematics is very important because you have this question of beauty and often there is mathematics in it. You have to be very precise in the proportions.
What’s interesting to me is that the Tressage creates this soft, almost textile tension in gold. How do you achieve that?
I like to speak about living architecture. To have an architecture in movement is a way to think about the future and now we have the savoir-faire that enables us to create this architecture in three dimensions. And this is so linked, so connected to what we are as a jeweller, and it is so interesting to prospect it. But I’m going away from your question.
I love where we’re going.
But your question is so important to me. It’s like this: to give the feeling of movement on a rigid architecture or motif is a new step. It’s important because you give life to your product. It’s connected to the future, in a way.
“I like the fact that you can have this notion of movement, attitude and meaning on a watch which is not a high jewellery watch.”
What advancement in savoir-faire would you say has given you the most creative possibilities?
Honestly, 3D printing is so interesting for us. Everything is possible in terms of shape. So imagine for a designer how incredible it is.
The new Panthère bangle has a resemblance to the Reflection de Cartier from last year. But where the Reflection was abstract, the Panthère is a figurative sculpture.
It’s very different, it’s true. I don’t know if there is a connection—it’s so strange because for us we don’t like the connection. But you’re not the first one, everybody is making the connection. It’s very interesting. It’s interesting to work on the Panthère because there is a constraint you don’t have for fine jewellery. We have to integrate the movement in a big number of cases and usually it’s on a two-dimensional flat pattern. We have some panthers featuring the head and body, but it’s more in high jewellery. Here, the idea is to go further and feature the sculpture of the head and body. Not only this—what’s interesting for me is to sense the attitude of the panther. It’s in movement, there is a story behind it. We have this panther which is trying to caress time like a toy. I like this story and the fact that you can have this notion of movement, attitude and meaning on a watch which is not a high jewellery watch.
In creating something as wonderful as this, do you think it’s okay if you can’t really read the time?
If you move your hand you can read the time with no issue. I think it’s more how you play with your jewel to be able to read the time and I like this connection. I like this detail, which I call the luxury of the invisible. [Cérède flips the Panthère bangle over to show me shaped paw pads on the underside of the feline sculpture.] All these little details are important.
There is a new Panthère de Cartier with red, orange and black stripes. Not quite the classical cat. I felt it had a connection to the abstracted animal watches from last year.
You’re right.
Cartier is known for its animal designs. But these are not so literal. Why did you remove the specificity and go into abstraction?
Because it’s a way to go beyond what we have done in the collection. The one we all know about is the panther spots. We have the duty to nourish our vocabulary with new DNA, with a new style. We did it, as you observed, with hybridisation of the animals last year and so this is a new chapter to explore. I like what you said, ‘abstract’. It’s like a painting. What do you want to see? Is it a zebra or a tiger? It’s cool because there is this little touch of humour. When it’s not immediate and literal, it gives you the power of imagination.
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