I’ve always had a soft spot for the artists and craftsmen who create amber jewelry in northern Poland. I’ve visited there a couple of times for the annual Amberif trade fair and they’ve always treated me like family.
Amber jewelry isn’t for everyone. Many of the designs are big and bold and the material itself, prehistoric tree resin, is extremely light when compared to fine jewelry. But much of the jewelry being produced in northern Poland is fashionable and artistic and can easily compete on the world stage. One of the most celebrated amber jewelry designers and a central figure in the amber industry is Mariusz Gliwinski, head designer (along with his wife, Mariusz) of the family owned firm, Ambermoda.
I caught up with Gliwinski during the recently held JCK Las Vegas jewelry trade show. Every year he seems to produce jewelry that’s more thematic and avant-garde. This year he introduced Multi, a collection that uses silver, amber and other materials, such as bottle caps (see top). The inspiration for this collection is the ancient lamellar armor (consisting of small plates laced together in parallel rows) worn by ancient warriors in Asia, Europe and North Africa.
On a more traditional note, he introduced a collection of black amber hearts studded with diamonds and set in either gold or silver (left).
Below is a necklace made of different shades of light-colored amber with silver.
The newest version of the Ernst Benz ChronoScope timepiece honors the tradition of the authentic aviation chronographs and famous wrist timers worn by pilots in the 1940’s.
The automatic Valjoux 7750 movement measures elapsed time in seconds, minutes and hours, while displaying the day and date. The dial is housed in a brushed and polished stainless steel case and is available in 47mm, 44mm and 40mm. The dial comes in no fewer than 11 colors and styles and strap is available in leather or steel.
The ChronoScope was initially created in response to the demands the Swiss watch brand received from aviators for a reliable and easily legible chronograph. It has evolved since its release, both aesthetically, while maintaining the styling and character of the original model.
Legibility was one of the most important criteria of timepieces in the 1940s. The dials were designed to resemble those of the era’s aviation instruments while their diameter allowed for large numerals and oversized hands for instant readability. A highly functional timekeeper and also a visual experience, a chronograph is a complicated watch, endowed with an additional mechanism enabling it to calculate the duration of an event.
De Beers Diamond Jewellers is celebrating 120 years of craftsmanship with an exhibition in Tokyo using new 3D technology.
The exhibition is in the form of window displays at Isetan, the world-famous department store. The 3D film is shown on Alioscopy screens in the store windows, giving consumers an insider view of De Beers diamond jewelry through multimedia displays. The exhibition will run through July 21.
The stereoscopic 3D film captures the beauty and sparkle of De Beers jewelry shown in a continuous loop of visual artistry. The 3D film is shown on a customized screen that does not require viewers to wear special glasses and allows the finest details of the jewelry to be seen.
The technology is first for Japan and the jewelry world, according to the two London-based companies that created the visual display: Holition, which creates advanced 3D technology applications for retail and Pointy Stick Films, a newly formed 3D production company.
Holition previously made the virtual pages of the Jewelry News Network with a Tissot window display in London that allowed consumers virtually try on watches.
If you are going to brand a diamond after the one of the most glamorous cities in the world, it better be one brilliant gem.
The Las Vegas Cut Diamond is certainly ambitious enough to be compared to the sparkle of Sin City. The 111-facet diamond boasts extraordinary light performance, fire and brilliance, says Kimberlight Brands, the company that recently received a patent to produce this new diamond.
Heather Kirk and Laura Serena are co-owners of the Calgary, Canada-based company, which specializes in creating luxury brands.
This new diamond cut, which is planned for a fall release, is available for stones of one carat or greater, the company said. Initially, the diamonds will be sold loose through limited release. Master diamond cutter Mike Botha of Embee Diamonds is the exclusive cutting and polishing supplier for this branded diamond. Each stone will be graded by AGS Laboratories.
For more information, e-mail diamonds@lasvegascut.com or call 888 99 LV CUT.
The style of cameos for jewelry hasn’t changed much in Southern Italy since people began carving the hand-made relief images out of sea shells in the 15th Century. However, one company near Naples—the epicenter of the cameo and coral industry in Italy—is trying to create cameo jewelry that appeal to young, fashion conscious consumers, while maintaining traditional techniques.
Di Luca 1929 is adding color and diversifying its designs. In addition, the Caserta-based company is making smaller cameos the size of charms that can be collected and worn as necklaces, earrings and bracelets; and matched with inexpensive gemstones.
Gino Di Luca said at the JCK Las Vegas jewelry show that the idea is to create a style and price point that will appeal to younger women. He said the product is doing well in Japan and that he believes there is a market in the U.S.
To show that the company is serious about maintaining the traditional way of creating cameos, it brought to the trade show one of its master cameo carvers who working on new relief figures on the exposition floor.
The jewelry should be appearing in stores in the fall.
It’s difficult to say, much less build, but independent Swiss watchmaker Thomas Prescher says he has created the world’s only triple-axis flying tourbillon wristwatch.
As Prescher explain it, a normal tourbillon is supported by bridges top and bottom that obstruct a clear view into the tourbillon. He said he chose to make his triple-axis tourbillon fully “flying,” in other words supported by just one side so the triple-axis tourbillion can easily be seen.
The triple-axis tourbillon mechanism is driven by two conical gears. Prescher says the difficulty in supporting anything by just one end is balance. “When an object is supported on two sides its equilibrium is not as critical as if it is supported on only one. However, imagine balancing an object moving through not one, not two, but three different planes.”
The triple-axis tourbillon mechanism includes an escapement wheel, pallets, anchor, balance spring and balance wheel. It is extremely light, with the smallest screw weighing less than 1/1000th of a gram. But he says it is actually heavy in relation to the amount of energy available.
Prescher says one of the major issues regarding multi-axis tourbillons is ensuring an ample supply of power to the escapement, the mechanism that regulates timekeeping. To resolve this problem, Prescher added a constant-force device inside the tourbillon cage turning around the first axis. This device transmits energy directly to the escapement six times per second. The main power train drives the tourbillon and recharges the constant-force spring so that it always has sufficient power on tap for the escapement.
The triple-axis tourbillon mechanism can easily be seen inside its black onyx dial. Regulator-style hours and seconds are each indicated in their own separate sub-dial, while the constantly animated tourbillon tracks the minutes during its one-hour rotation. The dial and mechanism is housed in a pink-gold case.
Prescher is offering tours of his workshop in Twann, Switzerland, this summer. Visitors will be able to see how a timepiece is developed, produced, assembled and regulated; and learn about the machines used by watchmakers as well as the techniques they use to master their craft.
In addition, visitors will be able to sit at a watchmaker's bench and use their tools to work on real watch components, practice fine finishing techniques on a tiny steel part and, finish a real tourbillon bridge.
Contact Thomas Prescher at office@prescher.ch or at +41 (0)32 315 28 66 for more details.
Caption: Diane von Furstenberg (right) answers a question during a panel discussion at the FT Business of Luxury Summit. From left are Gillian de Bono, editor of the Financial Times How to Spend It section; Deepak Ohri, CEO of Lebuna Hotels & Resorts; Marissa Mayer, VP, Search Products & User Experience, Google Inc; and Edgar Huber, CEO of Juicy Couture.
You could say that fashion icon Diane von Furstenberg was into social media before it was cool. In fact she was into communicating with her customers in an open, honest and organic way before there was an Internet, much less Web 2.0. So while many luxury and fashion companies are struggling to take advantage of social media tools, for von Furstenberg, it was just another way of doing what she has always done. In other words, she gets it, because she always understood the value of open communications with her customers.
“I started when I was very, very young,” the 63-year-old owner of DVF fashion house said during a panel discussion titled, “Communicating Strategies,” at the recently held FT Business of Luxury Summit. “For whatever reason, I established a relationship with women. And it was very caring, it was very real. And people have a personal relationship with me… And the reason why it works is because it’s real, it’s authentic, it’s harmless. My mission in life is to empower women. It’s more important for me that she feels empowered and then I sell her a dress. The dress is afterward. It’s a consequence that if she wears it she will be happy with it.”
Von Furstenberg told the audience of luxury professionals that she loves to use Twitter but she will never use it to tell people to buy DVF products. She spoke about a time when one of her employees tried to use the social media tool to recruit 60,000 followers.
“I got so upset. I don’t want to force people to do that. It has to happen organically. In my work and how I run my business, it’s organic, it’s real. And that is part of having a reputation and that’s how people believe in you,” she said. “So I feel that it can’t be forced. Not everything starts with marketing. For me it’s making the best product for the best price, the best design to make women happy, and therefore the sale is the consequence of a good product, the marketing is a consequence of the demand. But if everything you do is market driven then it’s no longer real and somehow the consumers will know that and they will not believe you anymore.”
The creator of the wrap dress also told the audience of a revelation she had six months ago when it came to how she views her company’s Web site.
“I always thought that our headquarters was in the (New York) meat packing district,” von Furstenberg said. “We were having a meeting with everybody and I said, ‘You know what? Our headquarters is really on the Web.’ So, we are now in the process of changing our Web site—which is very successful in both editorial and e-commerce—because you forget about it, but anybody who wants to know about anything: whether they want a job with your company, or have to do a paper on you, or they want to buy something, or whatever it is, they go on the Web and therefore the Web site is you image to the universe.”
Under the questioning of Gillian de Bono, editor of the Financial Times How to Spend It luxury magazine, who was the most probing of the FT editors who led panel discussions, von Furstenberg discussed how she views her own boutiques and department stores.
“Boutiques offer a way to control your destiny, a way to control your brand,” she said. “How you sell it, how you show the experience of a woman. My goal in my shops is to make sure that a woman who walks in leaves happier than she was when she came in. It’s not about how much I will sell her. It’s how happier I can make her. And that works for bricks and mortar and it also works for the Net. It’s an environment where I want a woman to come in and I want to make her happier.
On department stores: “Department stores also are a brand and they are larger brand and they do some editing for you, I mean for the consumer. Department stores are like editors, they edit, they buy, they choose, they decide who goes next to whom so I think they are important, too. And if you don’t think they do a good job, you pull out.”
Von Furstenberg even talked about an increased need for editors in this new communications age.
“I think that now we live in a world where everyone has access to everything,” she said. “You can reach everything, reach everyone, know everything. And strangely enough, I think that makes the need for editors even more important. Because we have access to everything, because we can reach everything, I believe that editors should not be afraid. The value of editors will increase. Some of them start are bloggers, they call themselves bloggers, but their dream is to be editors. And the editors now start to blog, so there are all kinds of merges … and therefore you have to respect those editors who say, ‘I like it because.’ I think that editors should absolutely not be afraid of what’s going on in this huge revolution.”
The von Furstenberg brand remains as popular as when she burst onto the fashion scene in the early 1970s, particularly with a younger clientele. She claims to be somewhat mystified with her appeal to young people but, no doubt a part of the reason for this is her ability to talk directly with her customers using modern communications tools.
“I really don’t know how it happens, but the older I am, the younger my consumer base is.”
The FT Business of Luxury Summit, hosted by the Financial Times, was held June 14 and 15 at the Beverly Hills Hotel in Beverly Hills, Calif.
This blog is for those who are passionate about jewelry and watches and want to learn more about the industry. It's a place to find the best new products from all over the world and the latest news about the business of jewelry, watches and luxury. Readers gain a backstage pass to the glamour, fun and difficulties of the industry.
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