Coco Chanel loved coromandel screens - and now they have inspired a high jewellery collection
Coromandel collection’s 59 pieces, named after lacquerware she collected in 1910s, feature designs and gems echoing details and colours of adored items
The late French fashion designer Gabrielle “Coco” Chanel’s adored Coromandel lacquer screens provided stunning touches of Asian inspiration to the luxury brand’s high jewellery Coromandel collection
The first time Chanel set eyes on a Coromandel lacquer screens, featuring scenes with fine detailing in black, gold and red, during the 1910s she became infatuated.
“I cried out, ‘It’s so beautiful!’. I had never said that about any other object,” she recalled.
Coromandel lacquer is a type of Chinese lacquerware which became popular in 17th and 18th century France and other European countries for decorative purposes.
I cried out [at seeing the Coromandel screen]: ‘it’s so beautiful!’. I had never said that about any other object
The lacquerware – made into large folding screens, sometimes with up to 12 leaves – gained its distinctive name of Coromandel in the West because it was transported to European markets from ports on the Coromandel coast of southeast India, where the big shipping companies of the time, such as the Dutch East Indies Company, were based.
Chanel became a huge admirer. People who have visited her second-floor flat at 31 Rue Cambon in Paris – the building she acquired where she opened her boutique on the ground floor – will discover the space heavily accented with these beautiful screens.
Even if you do not have immediate plans to visit the apartment in the French capital, you will still be able to see what all the fuss is about.
For the first time, Gabrielle Chanel’s treasured Coromandel screens are taking centre-stage in the brand’s new high jewellery collection.