LONDON — For more than 170 years, Cartier has been supplying British royalty, Hollywood stars, maharajas and socialites with precious designs, each of which tells a story or marks a moment in history.
Those rich and colorful designs are now on display at the Victoria and Albert Museum in an exhibition called “Cartier” that focuses on the jeweler’s ties to Britain. It opens on Saturday and runs until Nov. 16.
“The exhibition is the culmination of 10 years of hard work and collaboration,” said Laurent Feniou, managing director of Cartier U.K. in an interview. “Cartier enjoys a long and important presence in London — a connection to British society.”
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He said that to mark the coronation of Edward VII in 1902, the maison opened its doors in London for the first time.
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“We had the privilege of receiving the Royal Warrant from the king in 1904, as well as the warrant of every British monarch and, in many cases, their consorts as well.” Cartier’s Royal Warrant was renewed last year by King Charles III.
There are more than 350 objects on display, ranging from never-seen-before tiaras, brooches, watches, clocks, drawings and imagery to special objects that have been loaned by King Charles, museums from around the world and private collectors.
There are pieces that belonged to Queen Elizabeth II, Grace Kelly, Jackie Kennedy, Elizabeth Taylor, Wallis Simpson, Barbara Hutton, Daisy Fellowes and even Tyler, the Creator.
Co-curators Rachel Garrahan and Helen Molesworth said they spent the last 18 months studying every metal and colored gemstone, and fact-checked every detail behind the pieces, while Molesworth’s began her research three years ago.
The centerpiece of the exhibition is the Manchester tiara from 1903 that Consuelo, Dowager Duchess of Manchester, had commissioned with more than 1,000 cut diamonds and more than 400 rose-cut diamonds.
“It’s one of the key objects that sums up so much about Cartier at the turn of the 20th century. It was made in Paris for an American heiress who had married into a British family,” said Garrahan during a preview.
Cartier earned its reputation as one of Paris’ preeminent jewelers when Louis Cartier joined the firm in 1898 and took design in house. His study of the decorative arts is prominent throughout the exhibition, with pieces that take inspiration from the geometry found in Islamic art. The shapes would later be adopted by the Art Deco movement.
There are also displays dedicated to how Cartier translated the traditional arts of China, Japan, Iran, Egypt and the Russian Empire, where the House of Fabergé was famed for its decoratively colorful designs.
There are also side-by-side displays showing how Cartier borrowed from Fabergé. A cute Cartier rabbit carved out of amethyst was modeled after a Fabergé chalcedony chinchilla.
One of the rooms touches on how Cartier has given life to the ideas and dreams of its clients — a hefty list of kings, queens and aristocrats.
There’s an aquamarine pine flower tiara that King George VI bought for his wife Queen Elizabeth, The Queen Mother, which is now owned by Princess Anne; a pair of ruby and diamond flower brooches commissioned by Queen Elizabeth II in 1943, and Indian-inspired, long beaded necklaces commissioned by Nancy Lancaster using rubies, natural pearls and diamonds.
The most impressive commissions in the Cartier archive come from the maharajas of India.
In 1928, Bhupinder Singh, Maharaja of Patiala, commissioned the largest job Cartier has had to date.
Using thousands of precious gems from his personal collection, including a yellow 234.65-carat De Beers diamond, Cartier created two pieces of jewelry. One was a necklace with five rows of diamonds (2,930 in total) and two rubies with the De Beers yellow diamond sitting at the center. The other was a choker made from yellow and white diamonds.
The exhibition demonstrates the stark difference in royals’ tastes, and how Cartier has been able to adapt to them.
The pieces commissioned by the British royal family are relatively modest, with fewer (but still rare) gemstones.
Queen Elizabeth II had the pink diamond which she had received as a wedding gift in 1947 turned into a brooch, later known as the Williamson diamond brooch.
She wore the brooch countless times including to the weddings of Prince Charles and Lady Diana Spencer in 1981, and Prince Edward and Sophie Rhys-Jones in 1999. She also wore it to meet President Barack Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama in 2009.
The Duke and Duchess of Windsor ordered pieces that were full of personality and wit.
Wallis Simpson had Christian Dior create her a dress that matched her bib necklace made of amethyst, turquoise, diamonds and gold.
In 1940, the Duke of Windsor commissioned Cartier to create a flamingo brooch made of emeralds, rubies, sapphires, gold, diamonds and citrine that reflected his wife’s colorful character.
“Cartier jewels were worn by powerful women. They project something about the wearer — the Duchess of Windsor was not a shrinking creature,” said Garrahan, pointing out the diamond panther on a cabochon sapphire that the Duke of Windsor commissioned for his wife.
Simpson’s pieces were nature-inspired, and she certainly wasn’t alone in her indulgence of wild animals. Jeanne Toussaint, Marchesa Casati, Barbara Hutton and Daisy Fellowes were all owners of variations of Cartier’s panther.
Toussaint was Cartier’s creative director of jewelry from 1933 to 1970. In her time at the house, she earned the nickname of La Panthère, which has become a Cartier emblem.
Marchesa Casati took her love of the panther to a whole other level. “She would stalk her way through Venice in the middle of the night wearing just a fur coat with her pet panther on a lead. There was this kind of exoticism of taming the wild cat,” said Garrahan.
Pierre Rainero, Cartier’s director of image, style and heritage, added that the panther was a “symbol of a new role of women in society — women who enjoyed freedom in behavior and they could state their new status through the representation of an animal that is perceived as independent.”
The panther made its first appearance at Cartier in 1914 and by the late ‘40s the maison was receiving more panther-based commissions with the Duke and Duchess of Windsor being among their top clients.
In 1963, Mexican actor María Félix commissioned Cartier to add to her menagerie of animal-inspired jewels by asking them to make her a snake.
The finished product featured a snake’s lifelike movement with 2,473 diamonds and an underside of scales in black, red and green enamel that was a nod to the Mexican flag.
“Cartier used its relationships with royalty and aristocracy to build its name and spread its reputation, but as the century goes on, they are replaced by celebrity and this idea of famous movie stars wearing Cartier on screen or representing Cartier in some way,” said Garrahan.
Rainero explained that Cartier’s relationship with celebrities began in 1909 in New York when the jeweler set up its business stateside.
“[Cartier] was not very well-known at the time except from the minority of American clients who used to go to Paris. Cartier would lend pieces to socialites and Broadway actresses to demonstrate its innovation,” he said.
At the exhibition, Gloria Swanson’s diamond bracelets from the 1933 film “Perfect Understanding” are on display along with Grace Kelly’s 10.48-carat step-cut diamond Cartier engagement ring that she wore in her final film “High Society.”
Cartier’s reach is also marked subtly with its timepieces — a Tyler, the Creator watch is displayed next to Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis’ Tank wristwatch that was a gift to the-then Mrs. Kennedy in 1963 by her brother-in-law Prince Stanislaw “Stas” Radziwill.
The 18-karat gold watch features an engraving that reads “Stas to Jackie 23 Feb. 63 2:05 am to 9:35 pm.”
The noted times refer to the beginning and end of a 50-mile hike in the Palm Beach, Fla. area, which reflected a short-lived fad of the Kennedy era. President John F. Kennedy, noticing many Americans at the time were leaving physical fitness by the wayside, encouraged citizens to embrace a healthier lifestyle and challenged his White House staff to lead by example.
The Cartier Tank was acquired by Kim Kardashian in 2017 for $379,500, triple its estimate of $120,000, but has since been acquired by Cartier.
The exhibition ends as it started with Cartier’s crowning glory — tiaras. Some 18 pieces are on show, ranging from an unusual commission by Mary Alice Cavendish, Marchioness of Hartington in 1937 using opals and diamonds, to a tiara from 1926 that can be worn as bracelets.
There are thousands of diamonds on display — proof that those rocks are forever.