Business

04 September 2015

Elie Top’s Celestial Mechanics

Known for the fashion jewelry he created at Lanvin, Elie Top has produced his first collection of jewelry that is ultra technical and with a hint of vintage charm.

Between figurative and abstract, poetry and scientific rigor, Elie Top’s “Les Mécaniques Célestes” stands out as the most remarkable collection of recent months. It is not just beautiful: it deciphers, hints and interprets. The journey never ends. The idea came from an exhibition catalogue from the Kugel Gallery in Paris. It continues with the semantics associated with the names of jewels: Pluto, Flying Saucer, Five planets. References mingle and juxtapose like a cabinet of curiosities. The planets, inspired by a metal sugar bowl open out on articulated armillary spheres set with diamonds, are interlinked around an axis. Strange stones with opalescent and iridescent reflections, like labradorites and moonstones are put into orbit.

The theme of cosmogony is not new in jewelry. However, the treatment Elie Top reserves for it is unique. Thanks to a 3D technique, “allowing a precision unattainable with the human hand“, the collection is characterized by the mathematical purity of it assembly. The suborbital micro parts are laser welded. With a watchmaker’s precision, each worked piece is set with microscopic diamonds and exudes an indescribable poetry amplified by the mix of gold and blackened silver or blued and then lightened. The magic of Elie Top, a Parisian-society bohemian artist, works… Each piece seems to have weathered with time, the earrings are similar to “dormeuses” from the twentieth century. With this collection of jewelry, Elie Top immediately anchors the grammar of his very personal style.

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