Chanel has launched covetable new additions to its Camélia jewellery collection, including a four-stranded plastron necklace. Check out all the details below
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In the hothouse of blooms favoured by the fashion industry, the camellia undoubtedly belongs to Chanel.
According to house lore, Gabrielle Chanel adored the sculptural-looking camellia, with its whorls of symmetrical petals, and admired the practicality of its scentless nature which clash with her chosen perfume.
Some believe it’s because Chanel was deeply moved by the heroine of Alexandre Dumas’ 1848 novel, La Dame aux Camélias, who wore the bloom as a subtle code to telegraph her availability to her potential lovers. Others ascribe the designer’s fondness for the flower to the memory of her great love, Arthur ‘Boy’ Capel, who is said to have given her a bouquet of camellias as a gift.
Whatever the reason, Chanel adopted the camellia as her own personal emblem, adding it to a clutch of other talismanic symbols – like the lion, the star, the ear of wheat, and the number 5 – which gave her a source of comfort, security and creative inspiration. She was first pictured pinning a camellia to her own outfit as early as 1913, and then introduced the floral motif into her fashion and costume-jewellery designs – where it has blossomed ever since.
Since the early 1990s, the camellia has bloomed across the maison’s fine jewellery, too, its dewy petals and fleshy leaves expressed in precious gold and adorned with diamonds in its Camélia collection. Now, Chanel has unveiled sleek new additions to its garden of Camélia pieces, including an elegant, four-stranded plastron necklace (available in either 18K yellow or white gold), with draped gold chains punctuated with diamond-set camellia motifs.
For the first time, new Bouton De Camélia creations have been also released in 18K rose gold for a supple, camellia-strewn choker necklace, bracelet, climbing earrings, pendant necklace, stud earrings and statement rings, all adorned in white diamonds.
Finally, the latest bouquet of camellia designs is finished off with a slinky new Extrait De Camélia bracelet, in either 18K rose or yellow gold, for lovers who’d rather wear their hearts on their sleeves (or, in this case, around their wrists) like the original Dame that Chanel herself so admired.
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