De Beers London Opened its Parisian flagship during Haute Couture week one evening that will be remembered.
There are evenings that just happen by themselves. January in the Rue de la Paix, the cars slowing down, the glances exchanged. In front of the 12, personalities and fashionistas crowded into a barely contained frenzy, and the shop, bright and clean, resolutely modern, held everyone’s attention.
The space imagined with the Pierre-Yves Rochon studio is both a cabinet of curiosities and a private salon. The interiors evoke southern Africa without ever resorting to literal illustration: a piece of kimberlite, the rock in which diamonds are formed, is juxtaposed with sober woodwork and lighting designed to reveal the materials.
That same evening, Vibrations made her debut and with her Echo, Five unique creations inspired by the Namibian Fish River Canyon. The centerpiece: a transformable necklace that breaks down into six distinct jewels, centered on a 1.12 carat Fancy Intense Blue diamond. Around it, more than 193 carats of white diamonds, including baguette-cut stones on the work to marry the repetitive motifs of the design.
What stands out is the contrast between the rough diamonds, harvested from old riverbeds in Sierra Leone through the initiative GemFair and brilliant in their polish. The origin and the culmination, juxtaposed as a given fact.
«Our customers will be able to travel to Namibia, South Africa, Botswana and now to Paris.» Emmanuelle Nodale, CEO of De Beers London
As we walked out of Rue de Paix, we had the impression that certain places give off that feeling of having witnessed a beginning. The rock. The water. The time. And the light of a blue diamond that didn’t need any more words to be described.
