To celebrate 150 years of creating uniquely beautiful and spectacular jewelry and watches, Chopard has introduced Animal World, a collection of 150 individual pieces inspired by all pedigree of wildlife. The idea came to co-president and artistic director Caroline Gruosi-Scheufele one sleepless night, and resulted in the imagination of precious dragons, seahorses, monkeys, turtles, polar bears, and other earthly and unearthly beasts.
Grousi-Scheufele told WWD, “I really wanted to make them like little sculptures.” And with that dream, the Animal World collection was born. It took 20,000 hours of work and involved setting more than 250,000 stones to complete. Each piece is built around a different gemstone, and varies in shape and size. They also took to more unexpected stones and materials like quartz, moonstones, red gold, kunzites, pearls, and Paraiba tourmalines to evoke a fantastical feeling to the creatures.
Just a few of our favorite things from this kingdom of animals? The Monkey Pendant features two curious primates, set with brown diamonds, hanging from palms and feasting on red berries. Or there is the Frog Ring in white gold set with emeralds, black and white diamonds, holding a crown featuring an outstanding brilliant-cut yellow diamond entirely surrounded by yellow diamonds. The Storks Earrings are an impressive mix of white and red gold with two briolette-cut kunzites representing the little bundle of joy. Animals have seriously never looked so good.
The collection is comprised of both jewelry and watches, and all are equally astounding pieces of showmanship and design. The expert artisans of Chopard were truly put to the test in bringing these animals to life. Each piece is more luxurious and imaginative than the next.
