It was a stroke of luck for the designers chez Chanel that Mademoiselle Gabrielle loved sailing. The motifs of the maritime world present a rich source of inspiration for a jewellery collection with a refreshing colour palette of crisp white and blue. The jewels are named for the magnificent four-masted, black-hulled Flying Cloud yacht that belonged to Hugh Grosvenor, the second Duke of Westminster and one of the great loves of Coco’s life.
“Luxury is a necessity,” said Gabrielle Chanel, “that starts where necessity stops.” And it is this world of extreme luxury that Flying Cloud evokes. To enjoy the simple pleasures of sun on the face, wind ruffling hair and a lunch on the white deck of the Flying Cloud, 40 crew members were silently at work behind the scenes. Distilling luxury to its purest form was an art refined by Gabrielle Chanel, who taught the hidebound upper classes how to embrace the simple pleasures in life by turning them into the ultimate indulgence. In this mind-set, the blue of the high sea and an endless white horizon are captured in diamonds, sapphires, lapis lazuli, pearls and white gold.
Aboard the Flying Cloud, a sun-bleached, time-softened rope knot becomes a pearl and diamond bracelet. The golden braid on a captain’s epaulette morphs into a gold and diamond bracelet (above). Sailor’s buttons are elevated to precious jewels and lapis lazuli life buoys trail bubbles of pearls. The tattoo on a sailor’s arm transforms into a chic sapphire and diamond ring. More obvious motifs, such as anchors and compasses, are liberally enriched with a joyous abundance of diamonds.
Gabrielle Chanel’s liberty of mind and soul, be it a woman wearing a fisherman’s striped jersey jumper with trousers or mixing a rope of precious pearls with costume jewellery, were expressions of how she most elegantly – and permanently – changed conventions. Likewise, the Flying Cloud jewels transform functional knots, buttons and ropes into exquisite one-off jewels.
