GENIUS AT WORK Mixed Metiers

Chanel reimagines its iconic tweed-this time in platinum, pink gold, gemstones and pearls.

- Paige Reddinger

COCO CHANEL INTRODUCED her iconic tweed jackets and skirts nearly a century ago, and to this day her namesake brand continues to update and reinvent the look that built the company, sending fresh takes down the runway season after season. But this year, the Parisian house spun a new tale for its high-jewellery collection, creating an impactful and complex-piece that outshines its textile predecessors.

In order to produce the 'woven' texture of the Tweed Couture Patrimony necklace, Chanel had to develop entirely new techniques. "It was very complicated," says Patrice Leguéreau, director of the house's Fine Jewellery Creation Studio, with no little understatement. Leguéreau worked with the maison's jewellery workshop to connect hundreds of individual gem-set elements to gold chains. The result is strands of stones that look-and drape-as though they were tailored, not welded, together.

"It's like in fashion, when the dress is finished and it must be adjusted," he says. "It takes time to perfectly fit it to the specificity of the body of a woman." The necklace took a total of 1,700 hours to craft and is set with white diamonds, pearls, pink sapphires, and pink and red spinels. The coloured stones are what make the piece pop. "I chose the pink colour to express a very extreme femininity," says Leguéreau. "It's a colour that is very important to the Chanel universe."