How Japonisme still influences modern jewellery by Lalique, Cartier and Chaumet: Eastern motifs such as dragonflies, fish and bamboo continue to feature in many of today’s most stunning pieces

After two centuries of isolation from foreign powers, Japan reopened its ports for trading in 1854. Europeans were enthralled by the arts and culture that emerged, and Japonisme became a major influence within the late 19th-century art nouveau movement. The art nouveau style was defined by sinuous curves called whiplash lines, which were inspired by simple forms seen in Eastern design. Eastern – and particularly Japanese – style was also known for featuring natural elements; artists such as Claude Monet and Vincent van Gogh and jewellery designers including Réné Lalique and Georges Fouquet, for whom nature was the principal source of inspiration, were influenced by their exposure to the Japanese artistic style of presenting plants and animals. In jewellery, plants like chrysanthemums and Japanese azaleas, which were newly popular in Western gardens, were now being depicted in precious stones, while motifs incorporating wisteria and irises were borrowed from Japanese prints. In Paris, dragonflies, whose popularity in art nouveau jewellery around 1900 was attributed to their frequent appearances in Japanese art and poetry, featured in several ravishing Lalique pieces as a decorative motif, their iridescent wings decorated with plique-à-jour enamel. Over in New York, Louis Comfort Tiffany was also drawn to interpreting plants such as the chrysanthemum, which appeared in his jewellery, lamps and pottery, although orchids were his particular favourite. With their highly tuned eye for art and cultures other than their own, the Cartier brothers, Jacques, Pierre and Louis, also interpreted Japanese artistic traditions in the early 1900s. The result was beguiling jewels incorporating obi knots, motifs depicting katagami – the stencils used for dyeing textiles – and flora, all set with precious gems. They also created vanity cases that used Japanese lacquer with mother-of-pearl and enamel inlays. The inspiration of Japonisme continues today with the Bamboo high jewellery collection from Chaumet, a Place Vendôme jeweller which has long drawn from nature. While the bamboo plant is ubiquitous across East Asia, it is remarkably under-represented in jewellery. In Japan, it symbolises prosperity, while in China, it represents integrity and determination. The strong, slender lines of the bamboo appear in pieces such as a bib necklace and earrings, emblazoned with flecks of gold, black Australian opal and cushion-cut tsavorites that resemble windblown leaves. Simone Ng of Singapore-based Simone Jewels has long been fascinated by how Japonisme was embraced in the West during the art nouveau period. Her new high jewellery collection draws from the famous print The Great Wave off Kanagawa by Katsushika Hokusai, which Ng says “has resonated with me, not only for its iconic beauty but for its emotional power”, adding that it speaks of “nature’s majesty, the tension between chaos and calm”. It was the movement of the wave that stood out for the designer. With its foaming, curling arcs, the wave appeared so dynamic and fluid that “I saw the potential to translate this energy into the curves and intricate lines of art nouveau-style filigree gold,” she explains. She then set it with chalcedony and green-blue coloured gemstones as well as diamonds to pick out the ocean’s shifting colours. Another collection inspired by the movement of water is the aptly named Cascade line from the Atelier high jewellery range by Tasaki, a brand which often takes ancient Japanese landscapes as the starting point for its designs. The collection features cascading Akoya pearls paired with Paraiba tourmaline or tanzanite that mimic tumbling waterfalls. Japanese inspiration, however, can be interpreted in many ways. Harry Winston, for example, called on the artistic skills of Riusuke Fukahori for a 10-piece capsule collection of timepieces under its Marvellous Creations by Harry Winston Wild Treasures high jewellery range. Many of these have already been snapped up by customers. Fukahori is internationally acclaimed for his realistic goldfish paintings and after many years of trial and error, he has succeeded in miniaturising this to the confines of a watch dial. He created a unique technique – “2.5 Dimensional Painting” – in which the goldfish is hand-painted in different stages and each detail covered with a layer of resin; when observed from above, the separate layers merge and are magnified to form a vivid, realistic goldfish. Another way designers take inspiration from Japonisme is by using elements of Japanese craftsmanship and combining them with materials and precious gemstones less likely to appear in traditional Japanese ware to create astonishing, one-of-a-kind pieces. This is what Hong Kong designer Austy Lee does for his ongoing The Ancient Fetus collection, which he began in 2020 and is based on antiques he finds. He trawls antique fairs such as the Japantique Show in Tokyo, which showcases some of the finest antiques, selecting menuki, shakudo, lacquerware and Satsuma ware. He then transforms these pieces into modern, wearable, almost psychedelic, works of art that tell stories. “My habit of collecting antiques stems from the fact that each antique is a fragment of history and culture,” explains Lee. “It contains the essence of various ethnic groups and the author’s unique understanding and interpretation of that culture.”

How Japonisme still influences modern jewellery by Lalique, Cartier and Chaumet: Eastern motifs such as dragonflies, fish and bamboo continue to feature in many of today’s most stunning pieces

.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}Iconic Japanese themes continue to be reinterpreted by jewellery designers today, weaving stories of the country’s culture and nature into contemporary collections

Iconic Japanese themes continue to be reinterpreted by jewellery designers today, weaving stories of the country’s culture and nature into contemporary collections