SHORT AND SWEET FINDING AUTHENTICITY NORTHERN GEMS ...

Cartier has a long history of heritage
and creativity. How do you keep the
two relevant and the brand fresh
as Cartier moves forward into the
21st century?
The key notion is style. It’s what really
drives our activity from the beginning
till today. We are fortunate because
the founder, especially Louis Cartier,
the third generation of Cartier, had a
unique vision for style. He believed that
the notion of style could and should
evolve with time. At the same time
there is a paradox for every generation
and creation of Cartier: You recognise
a Cartier style, but you also see the
evolution linked to different generations.
This is quite unique in jewellery.
Cartier’s birth signifi cantly dates
back to the beginning of Paris
as we know it today (the end of
a monarchy, the beginning of a
republic). How, if at all, has the
‘birth’ of a new France impacted
the founding of the brand and its
evolution?
This is a really interesting question.
When we think about what makes our
culture and why the founder had that
vision, we have to go back to the period
Cartier was born. It was the mid-19th
century where everything was looking
possible. It was the beginning of the
Industrial Era and political developments
that saw the forces of democracy at
work. It was also a time where there
were many revolutions taking place in
Europe. I would think that probably this
had an infl uence for Cartier to always be
prepared to face the future.
Cartier has no sense of nostalgia;
everybody is facing the future and
adapting to the times. We work on
the notion of an evolving world and
acceptance of this change, but also
of integrating into that permanent
evolution.
How would you describe the Cartier
style? Is there a specifi c and distinct
feature to it?
There are many, many different
expressions to Cartier, but the common
denominator to a Cartier style is
ultimately elegance. This theme is really
central: The constant search of beauty.
We do have our own vision of beauty
and elegance. It is expressed by a
defi nite sense of proportion and volume,
where every piece is conceived in three
dimensions. We don’t have a magical
recipe, but we urge our designers to
learn constantly and to stay in tune with
their time. Perhaps the best comparison
how we defi ne our notion of style is to a
language. We have our own vocabulary
and grammar, but it’s our language.
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