One of Wallis Simpson’s most famous sayings was that “You can never be too rich or too thin,” and she could well have extended the aphorism to say … “or have too much bling.” The stylish American for whom King Edward VIII gave up his throne had another epic love affair: with jewellery. Yet her baubles were more than just expensive adornments. Through them, history, fashion and romance are perfectly combined and preserved forever.
In the opinion of David Bennett, Chairman of Sotheby’s Jewellery in Europe and
the Middle East, Simpson’s jewels are “the most important jewellery
collection put together in the 20th century”. When her collection was
first sold by Sotheby’s in 1987, the year after the Duchess of Windsor died
(the sale was announced on 12 December 1986, exactly 50 years after the
abdication), the auction held in Geneva caused a huge wave of interest. It
eventually raised $50m (31m) and set a new world record for a single-owner
jewellery collection.
Today, 20 pieces bought from the original collection will be sold at
Sotheby’s, and are estimated to reach in the region of 3m. If the $43m
difference between the estimate and the final figures for the 1987 sale are
anything to go by, today’s auction will raise considerably more than the
estimate. While buying baubles at this level is the preserve of the super
rich, it continues to fascinate a much wider group of people. Jewellery
remains the most potent symbol of extreme emotions; of passion, faith, hope,
power and greed. As Richard Edgecumbe, jewellery curator at the VA told
me when the museum opened a new jewellery gallery two-and-a-half years ago: “Jewels
are a potent link with the past, a celebration of art and craftsmanship, and
an embodiment of deep human emotions.”
You only have to look at the interest around Prince William giving Kate
Middleton his mother’s engagement ring to see how charged with symbolism
jewellery is. While clothes, shoes and bags receive far more attention in
fashion terms because they are affordable and renewed more frequently,
speculation about the royal meringue is so far secondary to the royal rock.
Prince William said he proposed with Princess Diana’s ring, “to make
sure my mother did not miss out on today and the excitement that we are
going to spend the rest of our lives together”. To some the gesture
will seem moving and optimistic, others will be unable to shake off the
sense that the ring is associated with some rather bad karma, given the
failure of his parents’ marriage. The unhappy saga doesn’t seem to have
deterred consumers from wanting their own take on Princess Diana’s sapphire
and diamond ring, however, as the high-street jeweller H Samuel reports a
150 per cent increase in searches for sapphires on its website, along with a
400 per cent increase in searches specifically for sapphire rings.
Engagement rings are charged with not just luck but etiquette – when Nicolas
Sarkozy proposed to Carla Bruni with the same model of Dior ring he had
given to his previous wife towards the end of the marriage, it was seen as a
considerable faux pas.
Many believe jewels go far beyond mere protocol and that they can be good luck
talismans, or cursed stones. As the private jeweller and Cartier expert
Harry Fane, who owns the Obsidian gallery in London, puts it, “they
have to be more than just rocks”. The Hope diamond is the most
legendary example of a stone deemed deeply unlucky, and unless you are
entirely immune to superstition, the chain of ill fortune which has followed
it seems convincingly dramatic. Believed to hail from the Kollur mine near
Golconda in India, legend has it that the deep blue, 112 carat, golf
ball-sized stone was taken from the brow of a temple idol by the French
merchant traveller Jean-Baptiste Tavernier in the 1660s. From then until
1958 – when it was donated to the Smithsonian museum in Washington by
jeweller Harry Winston, who sent it in a plain brown package by registered
mail – it was associated with the premature death, madness, suicide and
murder of many who possessed it, or their loved ones.
The Hope diamond is an extreme example of a stone, but a mix of attitudes
towards buying pre-owned jewellery prevails among high-end collectors.
According to Harry Fane, there are three main approaches to provenance. He
says there are certain people who simply don’t want to buy jewellery that
has belonged to someone else; those who aren’t concerned either way and will
just invest in a piece because they like it, and those for whom the story
behind a jewel, and in particular telling that story, will be more important
than the piece itself.
According to Fane, in the Sotheby’s sale “there is a synergy of all these
elements. The collection has an extraordinary provenance, it is historic and
romantic, and features major, exceptional pieces of jewellery by Cartier who
were the ‘King of Jewellers, Jewellers to Kings’. You can’t get better
examples of this kind of jewellery.”
While Tuesday’s sale of “Exceptional Jewels and Precious Objects formerly
in the collection of The Duchess of Windsor”, also contains items such
as cufflinks, buttons and medals belonging to Edward in his early life, the
jewels commissioned and exchanged by the king and his mistress-turned-wife
are likely to generate the most interest. The gem-set and diamond cross
bracelet by Cartier, is probably the most intimate piece, with each cross
bearing an inscription marking a critical point in the couple’s lives. One,
reading “God save the King For Wallis”, refers to an assassination
attempt on Edward, another records Simpson’s appendectomy. Another, with the
words “The Kings [sic] Cross” marks the time in 1936 that, after a
heated argument, Simpson hailed a taxi and said “King’s Cross” to
the driver. “I’m sorry lady,” he replied. Perhaps the most
remarkable item from a historical point of view is a gold and gem-set
cigarette case given to Edward (or David as she called him) by Wallis for
Christmas in 1935. On the lid is a map of Europe which shows holiday voyages
made by Edward and his guests – including Wallis Simpson – in 1934, 1935 and
1936. The final holiday, taken in the summer of 1936, would have been marked
on the case after Wallis had presented her lover with the gift. It is
particularly poignant because in 1936 he made the historic decision to
abdicate; it was during the cruise around the Mediterranean that the
couple’s relationship started to come out into the open after being reported
in the international press.
Wallis Simpson was a style icon, thanks to her unswervingly simple and
immaculate take on fashion. She was rigidly disciplined about what she wore
and about her figure; to maintain the lean frame necessary for the sleek
silhouette she favoured, it is said she would subsist on very little food if
she felt she had gained weight. She was a mistress of self-invention and
image, and it’s hardly surprising that Madonna is making a film about her
(WE, after Wallis and Edward, slated for release next year). Simpson’s
severe clothes provided the perfect foil for extravagant jewellery, and in
1936 as the love affair was about to reach boiling point, the society
chronicler Henry “Chips” Channon wrote that “Mrs Simpson was
literally smothered in rubies.”
There’s certainly nothing subtle about her taste in rocks, which seems to have
become increasingly opulent throughout her life. One of the standout pieces
of the sale – and one that became a familiar motif from the 1987 auction –
is a ruby, sapphire, emerald, citrine and diamond flamingo clip, mounted by
Cartier in Paris in 1940. In order to make the jewel, the Duchess had
several of her pieces unmounted so the stones could be reused; she did this
frequently, and even had jewels reset that previously belonged to Queen
Alexandra. Encouraged by the Duke, the avant-garde statement was designed by
Cartier’s high jewellery director Jeanne Toussaint (the designer behind
Cartier’s Great Cat jewels, who was known by Louis Cartier as panthre) and
designer Peter Lemarchand.
Another notable animal-inspired piece is the onyx and diamond panther
bracelet, designed in 1952, by Toussaint and Lemarchand. When I visited
Sotheby’s to preview the collection, Alexandra Rhodes, of Sotheby’s
International Jewellery Department, took it out of the glass and placed it
on my wrist, explaining that Lemarchand would sketch the big cats at the zoo
in Vincennes in France, in order to make his designs as lifelike as
possible. Its impressive miniature engineering – the articulated body
enables the cat to lie sleekly over the wrist, its paw stretching outwards –
conveys a powerful sensuality. Run your fingers across the pav diamonds
along its back and you can feel the animal’s musculature. If the bracelet
had been given to Simpson before the abdication it might have reflected her
image as a sexual predator, a kind of “Mata Hari” as Hugo Vickers,
author of Behind Closed Doors – The Tragic Untold Story of the Duchess of
Windsor, to be published in April 2011, puts it, fuelled by society rumours
that during a year spent in China in the 1920s Simpson had become skilled in
the erotic arts. By 1952, however, the message is more like here is the cat
that got the cream.
At least that’s what it looked like on the surface. Perhaps, however, these
later jewels tell the story not only of passion, but of excess and an
obsession with style borne of lack of purpose. In her 1988 book The Windsor
Style, Suzy Menkes reveals the underlying shallowness of the couple’s life
in exile in their lavishly decorated home in Paris. She repeats a line
spoken by Edward VIII to a friend, in which he says: “You know what my
day was today? I got up late and then I went with the Duchess and watched
her buy a hat.” It captures the rather empty pursuit of style that
characterised their days. The Duchess declared that she “would rather
shop than eat”, and spent much of her time being fitted for couture
dresses. In Menkes’ book, the Duchess of Marlborough, one of the couple’s
social circle, is quoted as saying, “I went to look at the flowers at
[the Duchess's funeral]. It was tragic. They were all from dressmakers,
jewellers, Dior, Van Cleef, Alexandre. Those people were her life.”
Of course this was over a decade after the Duke of Windsor had died, and the
Duchess was left a widow, and few lives can live up to the unfading, eternal
lustre of diamonds, sapphires and rubies. Despite the more nuanced reality
behind the image, and the fact that the Duke was already disillusioned with
the duties associated with being king when the romance blossomed, what these
jewels will be associated most with is a love affair powerful enough to make
a king give up an empire. That’s what will bring down the hammer at
Sotheby’s tonight.
Article source: http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/fashion/features/wallis-simpsons-jewellery-god-save-the-bling-2146950.html
Filed Under Fashion News
Tags: Ladies Shoes Fashion
