{"id":271896,"date":"2025-11-24T11:20:25","date_gmt":"2025-11-24T00:20:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.russh.com\/?p=271896"},"modified":"2025-11-24T11:20:25","modified_gmt":"2025-11-24T00:20:25","slug":"van-cleef-and-arpels-thailand","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.russh.com\/van-cleef-and-arpels-thailand\/","title":{"rendered":"Van Cleef & Arpels unveils a high jewellery odyssey in Phuket"},"content":{"rendered":"

When I arrived in Phuket this past February, the air hung heavy with warmth; the kind that makes time feel slower, more decadent. The Andaman Sea<\/a> glittered in shifting shades of turquoise and emerald, and the palms swayed as though they too were part of the spectacle. It was here that Van Cleef & Arpels staged the next celebration of its latest High Jewellery collection, Treasure Island<\/em>, an ode to Robert Louis Stevenson\u2019s 1883 adventure novel. The setting felt almost preordained \u2013 a tropical island infused with myth, nature, and the dream of discovery.<\/p>\n

The collection unspools like a story told in three breaths \u2013 adventure at sea, exploration of the island, and the treasure hunt. In the first, sailor\u2019s knots, rigging and currents become sculptural codes; in the second, palms, shells and gentle creatures are translated into a language of light; and in the third, maps, seals and chests channel the thrill of discovery. I moved through these worlds as though crossing a shoreline: diamonds reading as foam, sapphires as deep water, emeralds as shade. \u201cIt\u2019s the universality of the theme,\u201d Julie Clody-Medina, president of Van Cleef & Arpels Asia-Pacific told me. \u201cDeep inside, we are still children\u2026 The joyful side of adventure, with this thin line \u2013 not falling into caricature or cartoon \u2013 but always subtle, always refined, precious, elegant, with a touch of humour. That\u2019s what makes us stand apart, while still being so Van Cleef & Arpels.\u201d<\/p>\n

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What lingered, too, was the patience embedded in each jewel. The Maison\u2019s treasure begins long before a piece reaches a workshop bench. \u201cSome of the gems were sourced four years in advance, with this theme in mind,\u201d Clody-Medina said. \u201cIt\u2019s a treasure hunt in itself. We keep them aside until the right design emerges.\u201d<\/p>\n

You feel that deliberateness in the way stones seem destined for their settings \u2013 the narrative choosing the gem as much as the gem shapes the narrative.<\/p>\n

Craftsmanship, here, is a form of storytelling. The storied Mystery Set \u2013 patented in 1933 \u2013 appears in new expressions that feel airy, kinetic, almost tidal. \u201cOf course you will find the mystery-setting technique,\u201d Clody-Medina explained. \u201cIt exists since 1933 but it\u2019s constantly evolving\u2026 translating rigid, very hard material into something that looks so easy, but it\u2019s so not easy to make.\u201d<\/p>\n

There is transformability woven through the collection \u2013 objects with more than one life, ready to be composed like verses. \u201cA beautiful pendant can become a clip,\u201d she said. \u201cIt\u2019s a piece of art that is wearable, wearable in different options \u2013 and this is very Van Cleef & Arpels.\u201d<\/p>\n

She spoke, too, about the pieces that push technique to its limit. \u201cWe have eight creations in the collection with mystery setting, and we have two Vitrail Mystery Setting\u2026 there is absolutely no visible setting on a transparent, translucent stone,\u201d she said, describing a leaf and a wave with a near-liquid gradation. \u201cOne of the prides is this colour harmonisation\u2026 the thin line of subtlety of colour association through the volume, through the gradation. This is highly technical.\u201d<\/p>\n

In person, those transitions felt like breath \u2013 tones sliding from sea-blue to violet, from lagoon to dusk.<\/p>\n

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As we spoke, Clody-Medina kept circling back to wearability: beauty resolved into comfort. \u201cThe technique is at the service of functionality and wearability,\u201d she said. It sounds pragmatic until you pick up a jewel and feel how naturally it sits, how lightly it moves, how easily it changes form. Then the pragmatism dissolves into poetry. \u201cThe pieces by themselves are not that big,\u201d she reflected. \u201cThere is this love at first sight\u2026 and then you have the layering of understanding \u2013 the technique, the craftsmanship, the collective work to come up to that achievement\u2026 It\u2019s endless.\u201d<\/p>\n

It is also, as she put it, a reminder that high jewellery belongs in the history of art: \u201ca constant dance\u2026 between the past and the future, in flawless harmony, and with this dimension of poetry.\u201d<\/p>\n

Context threaded through the days, reminding us that treasure has always been a mirror of culture as much as a measure of wealth. We heard of cabinets and caskets across centuries, of shipwrecks heavy with porcelain and gold, of collections assembled and guarded as symbols as well as safeguards \u2013 histories that make the modern impulse to gather, protect and adorn feel timeless. Treasure Island<\/em> sits within that continuum: a contemporary cabinet of curiosities where literature, history and technique meet.<\/p>\n

If the daylight made the jewels feel sun-warmed and salt-licked, evening turned them introspective. Under softer light, away from the blunt brightness of midday, diamonds drew out their inner geometry instead of flaring; sapphires deepened to a steadier blue; emeralds cooled. The effect wasn\u2019t fireworks but resonance \u2013 tones settling, facets speaking more quietly, like the sea after the last swimmers have gone in. Standing there, I thought of Clody-Medina\u2019s words on colour and gradation, on the thin line that separates exuberance from excess. At night, that line felt perfectly drawn.<\/p>\n

I left Thailand without a jewel in my luggage, but with something that felt just as precious: the memory of tracing those gradations with my eyes, of feeling a pendant click into a new life as a clip, of hearing a philosophy of making that privileges time, precision and play in equal measure. Stevenson understood that treasure is as much idea as object; Van Cleef & Arpels understands it, too. The greatest treasures aren\u2019t always buried. Sometimes they are built \u2013 stone by stone, story by story \u2013 until what you\u2019re holding is not just a jewel, but a journey.<\/p>\n

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