Close to your skin and light years away: céphéide necklace and ultraviolet earrings by Van Cleef & Arpels
Celestial bodies fabulously beyond our reach and range of vision, many of which, even in these high-tech times, exist only in the calculations of mathematicians and astronomers and have yet to be captured by even the most advanced telescopes, it’s the stars and galaxies, constellations and nebulae that have inspired Van Cleef & Arpels to create their latest wonder: the ‘Sous Les Etoiles’ collection (translated as ‘Under the Stars’).
The designers and jewelers at Van Cleef & Arpels have reached into the depths of ancient archives and sci-fi movies, primitive old-time drawings and cutting-edge visualizations, NASA imagery and their own imagination, to look more closely at the skies.
The women from the paintings by Michal Lukasiewicz are wearing the one-of-a-kind Céphéide necklace and matching, unique Ultraviolet earrings from this new, stellar collection.
Cepheids – giant, pulsating stars – gave Van Cleef & Arpels the idea to create this eponymous, transformable necklace, featuring eleven chalcedony cabochons, mauve sapphires, tsavorite garnets and diamonds.
The deep, hypnotizing indigo of the night sky, revealing itself in dreamy two-tone tanzanites and mauve sapphires, is pierced by glowing diamonds of stars and the jolly verdure of tsavorites, reflected by the matching Ultraviolet earrings, complete with detachable pendants.
Preoccupied by our daily hustle and bustle, we have stopped paying attention to the skies. But have we, really? On 18 February 2021, NASA landed its rover Perseverance on Mars. To raise public awareness of this mission, NASA initiated a ‘Send Your Name to Mars’ campaign, where anyone could send their name to the Red Planet on a microchip, stored aboard the rover. Once registration had been completed, it turned out that a whopping 10,932,295 names had been submitted – all to be flown to Mars!
This euphoria over reaching out to the skies, the ambitious and competitive NASA and SpaceX projects, the butterflies we get in our stomachs when we look at creations as wonderful and exquisite as the ‘Sous Les Etoiles’ jewelry: everything points to how the stars have not been forgotten.
The galaxies of precious stones and metals, the ultra-sophisticated and poetic mastery of Van Cleef & Arpels’ jewelers and designers, the mesmerizing energy of the magnificent Céphéide necklace and Ultraviolet earrings are clear evidence that, even at the peak of the current bumpy ride, human hearts and eyes never stop looking – and finding – the beauty beneath and above the dome of the sky.
