Light is pure energy, emanating from the sun and stars, interacting with the world around us, revealing its many expressions. It can flash with intensity or radiate softness. Highlight shapes or create shadows. Shine with clarity or conjure optical illusions. When it touches a diamond, its colour, cut and the way it is set makes the relationship become even more mesmerising.
Following the launch in January of the first chapter of The Alchemist of Light High Jewellery collection, De Beers Jewellers continues to explore the natural, elemental magic of light, unveiling five new jewellery sets during Couture Week in Paris. The new chapter reveals the astonishing and diverse Dusk Reflection, Ascending Shadows, Midnight Aura, Optical Wonder and Frozen Capture sets that explore and interpret light in ever inventive ways.
The collection comprises a total of 45 one-of-a-kind pieces, with the new sets sitting alongside Atomique, a creative interpretation of diamonds at a molecular level and Light Rays, capturing the moment sunlight radiates across the morning sky.
"The Alchemist of Light High Jewellery collection represents the most creatively and technically ambitious collection we have ever conceived and crafted," says Céline Assimon, CEO of De Beers Jewellers. "It incorporates exceptional diamonds in white and fancy colours, including some specially selected from our Natural Works of Art collection. Our design studio, collaborating with our specialist craftspeople, has created individual pieces that are truly wearable works of art.
There are so many elements that push boundaries. The Dusk Reflection set not only has detachable elements, the magnificent choker transforms into two cuffs, a masterpiece of artistry and technical execution. Both the Ascending Shadows and Optical Wonder sets use coloured titanium and aluminium in striking pink and blue shades to sublime sculptural effect, showcasing both white and fancy colour diamonds. Midnight Aura, evocative of cosmic stardust, sets diamonds within the green gemstone chrysoprase, while Frozen Capture layers diamonds juxtaposed with rock crystal motifs. Every piece is as exquisite as it is extraordinary."
In a palette of pink and white, the Dusk Reflection set, with four unique designs, is inspired by a sunset radiating a soft glow over the horizon. The design incorporates De Beers' iconic Enchanted Lotus motif, inspired by the lotus, a flower associated with the sun because it blooms by day, retreats into the water at night, remerging fresh in the morning. The repetitive pattern is suggestive of daily rhythms.
Pieces are sensual and feminine, with white round brilliant diamonds woven within alternating rose and white gold settings. Satinée radial finishing lends the gold a brushed appearance, enhancing its radiance.
The magnificent choker is beautifully flexible and has a sensuous, tactile quality. A multiplicity of lotus motifs suspend an exquisite 1.13 carat, fancy intense pink radiant-cut diamond from De Beers Natural Works of Art collection. A near-invisible mechanical system allows the diamond to be detached and worn as a pendant on a longer necklace. Truly transformative, the choker also divides to create a pair of stunning cuffs.
The longline earrings in rose and white gold, featuring white diamond lotus motifs in delicate openwork, can also be worn as studs, or presenting a third styling opportunity, worn asymmetrically. The pendant necklace showcases a beautiful 1.02 carat round brilliant white diamond within a motif that can also be detached – the necklace with its graphic diamond motifs then becomes an elegant sautoir. Completing the set are the bold quadrilateral earrings surrounding a round brilliant diamond at their centres, a fusion of classic and contemporary design.
Boundary-pushing in style and story, the Ascending Shadows set contains seven spectacular pieces, architectural in shape, striking in shade. Its design cue is the way stepped surfaces dramatically play with light and shade, reminiscent of the spiral staircase in De Beers Jewellers' new flagship store in Old Bond Street, London. The inspired use of pink, blue and green anodised titanium and coated aluminium creates innovative surfaces on which to highlight rare pink and grey diamonds, as well as green and browny pink roughs.
Modern and magnificent in equal measure, the hero piece is the sweeping necklace. Graduating in size and shape, dark blue aluminium steps rise to meet light blue titanium set with white round brilliant diamonds. As these metals cannot be melded, the 142 separate elements have been individually articulated, demanding the application of a new skill in crafting High Jewellery. In fact, ten jewellers and five setters all worked to create this extraordinary necklace. Edged in white marquise-shaped diamonds and green roughs, the focus is an exquisite 3.41 carat fancy light grey pear-shaped diamond.
Echoing the dynamic movement of this spiral form, the large hoop earrings fan out, the duality of the blue aluminium and titanium showcasing two central 1.01carat white pear-shaped diamonds. In the same colour scheme, the dramatic drop earrings feature two fans folding out from 2.10 carat fancy dark grey square emerald-cut diamonds. Smaller earrings in intense rose aluminium reinterpret the fan-effect pattern, set with browny pink roughs, intense pink round brilliant and white marquise-shaped diamonds radiating from a central 1.02 carat pear-shaped diamond.
Two incredible rings step up to the theme in intense rose and light green aluminium, each with a plethora of white marquise-shaped and intense pink round brilliant diamonds set in light grey titanium, set with rare fancy coloured diamonds at their centres. To complete the set, and to take High Jewellery into a new direction, a bijou de tête features a sweeping double fan on a headband, set with white marquise and green roughs and a central 2.70 carat fancy grey oval-shaped diamond. This can be detached from the headband to be worn as a brooch.
Green clouds of stardust are the inspiration for the Midnight Aura set with its five inventive pieces. Black rhodium offers the perfect backdrop to peerless white round brilliant and princess-cut diamonds. These are innovatively set within cabochon-cut green chrysoprase from Africa, a technique that requires incredible precision.
The magical necklace is so precisely and delicately articulated, it feels like fabric, with hundreds of bezel-set diamonds creating a flexible mesh. Featuring an extraordinary 20.57 carat pear-shaped white diamond from De Beers Natural Works of Art collection, which can be detached, this piece can be worn in three different ways. The design is echoed in the chandelier earrings with a constellation of round brilliant diamonds cascading from magnificent pear-shaped diamonds that transform into studs.
Both rings are inspired by continuity and connection. In the first, pavé-set diamonds follow the symbol for infinity, with two chrysoprase cabochons flanking a 0.7 carat princess-cut white diamond. The second is an open ring with a 4.23 carat pear-shaped white diamond opposite a princess-cut diamond inlaid into chrysoprase. The theme of cosmic orbiting is also brought to life in the climber earrings, with a multiplicity of diamond cuts and settings that reflect the mystical cosmos.
Optical Wonder takes its inspiration from geometric patterns that create illusionary effects as seen in the work of Victor Vasarely, an exponent of the Op Art movement. The set contains seven striking pieces in which contrasting bold lines, created from pavéset diamonds and coloured aluminium, cast beams of reflected and refracted light, drawing the eye to the stunning hero diamonds. In keeping with the Op Art feel, some pieces are monochrome while others feature vibrant colours.
Dramatic black aluminium brings schematic resonance to the spectacular yellow rough and polished diamonds in the necklace and earrings. With its multiple, striped motifs, the necklace features an astonishing 3.02 carat fancy intense yellow radiant-cut diamond at its centre, a design echoed in the longline earrings that can be transformed into geometric studs. A double open ring decorates the hand with a trio of bold shapes, a 1.7 carat emerald-cut white diamond in the centre. A standout piece is the bangle with its alternating bands of yellow round brilliant pavé-set diamonds and black aluminium, showcasing a 3.02 carat fancy deep greyish green oval-shaped diamond.
Concentric shapes, a key pattern of Op Art, inspire the striking drop earrings. A myriad of yellow round brilliant diamonds swirl towards sublime fancy colour pear-shaped diamonds that become the central focus. In the two rings, one dramatic pink, one vibrant blue, white pavé-set diamond lines whirl on undulating, sculptural shapes, converging on the hero diamonds, with the pink ring adorned with no less than a 1.01 carat fancy intense pink radiant-cut diamond from De Beers Natural Works of Art collection.
