The angel of inspiration arrives when you least expect it. A completely mundane thing caught the eye of Robert Dumas, the man behind the Kelly bag and silk carrés at Hermès, while he strolled along the Normandy coast in 1937. A bucolic scene that would inspire one of the French luxury house’s most enduring icons: the nautical Chaine d’ancre design.
Boats moored, swaying on the water, held in place by anchor chains. The purely functional hardware—oval links bisected with a pin in the centre to add strength and prevent twisting—struck him as viable inspiration for what was then a burgeoning offer of jewellery at the French luxury design house. It released its first silver Chaine d’ancre bracelet a year later in 1938; and today the nautical chain is an indelible element of Hermès iconography.
The brand recently put on a showcase of pieces from the contemporary collection that displays the ingenuity of Pierre Hardy, creative director of jewellery, at twisting and turning this cult symbol into a multitude of forms. So varied it is that the jewellery in the collection today barely betrays a hint of its perfectly ordinary inspiration.
Preciousness taken to extremes with every conceivable surface encrusted with diamonds and gemstones; chain links stretched, shrunk, enlarged or layered to test the contrasts of its form against itself; or abstracted and transfigured into new shapes altogether—double rings from a stretched link, ear cuffs which manipulate the motif on the diagonal, and dinky sacs bijoux where strands of Chaine d’ancre links are gathered and shaped into facsimiles of a minaudière. Astonishing how far a bit of imagination can take even the humblest of ideas.
The March ‘Dualism’ issue of Vogue Singapore is available for sale online and in-stores.
