Celine Lighter

Now renowned for chic womenswear as well as luxury leather handbags that are often recognized for their iconic gold-tone fastening and hardware, French fashion house Celine got its start in children’s shoes.

In 1945, Céline Vipiana and her husband, Richard, opened a made-to-measure shoe shop for children at 52 rue de Malte in Paris. Designer Céline’s name graced the business, alongside a red elephant designed by French cartoonist Raymond Peynet that served as the company’s first logo.

In 1967, following an expansion into women’s shoes and leather accessories, the Vipianas decided to expand their company’s reach into women’s ready-to-wear, focusing on high-end sportswear. Céline Vipiana, who remained chief designer until her death in 1997, would oversee a range of fashion that would reach an international audience with a pared-down elegance and timeless style.

The company quickly achieved widespread success with its new offerings, most notably its trench coat, which became a staple for the brand. In the 1970s, they expanded outside Paris with boutiques in Monte Carlo, Beverly Hills and Hong Kong. In 1973, Céline Vipiana, inspired by chain links around the Arc de Triomphe, debuted the Blazon Chaîne motif of interlocking C’s. She began using it on a printed canvas and branding as well as accents on accessories, such as the Triomphe bag.

Vipiana’s designs were created to appeal as everyday fashion: Celine skirts, suits, fitted shirts, vests and coats were stylish but rooted in practicality. Quality, too, was paramount; Vipiana’s determination to deliver the best possible leather led to the opening of a studio in Florence, where the brand created its leather goods.

Vipiana died a year after her brand was acquired by Bernard Arnault’s luxury conglomerate LVMH for about $540 million. American designer Michael Kors then took the helm as creative director. Kors, too, was known for practical but chic ready-to-wear. He introduced such luxury staples as cashmere sets, smartly tailored pants and simple slip dresses, plus themed collections around jet-setter locales like Monte Carlo and Tahiti. Following Kors’s departure in 2004, onetime Burberry designer Roberto Menichetti took the job for just a year. He was followed by designer Phoebe Philo, the young British designer who is now credited with establishing Celine’s 21st-century style.

Philo created a distinct, minimal style that channeled the brand’s roots of practical simplicity with luxury materials. (“I just thought I’d clean it up,” she quipped of her debut collection in 2010.) Over the course of ten years, Philo turned the company into a beloved fixture of the fashion industry. In 2018, after Philo’s departure, the house tapped Hedi Slimane, former creative director of Yves Saint Laurent, as its new leader; he caused a stir when he famously removed the accent from the brand name. Controversial though it was, Slimane maintained it was a return to the label’s roots: an exercise in strong simplicity.

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Fascination with the Jazz Age is endless, and even today jewelry designers continue to be inspired by authentic Art Deco jewelry and watches.

The Art Deco period, encompassing the 1920s and ’30s, ushered in a very distinct look in the design of jewelry. There were many influences on the jewelry of the era that actually began to take shape prior to the 1920s. In 1909, Serge Diaghilev brought the Ballet Russes to Paris, and women went wild for the company’s exotic and vibrant costumes It’s no wonder, then, that jade, lapis lazuli, coral, turquoise and other bright gemstones became all the rage. There already existed a fascination with the East, particularly China and Japan, and motifs consisting of fans and masks started to show up in Art Deco jewelry.

However, the event that had the greatest influence on Deco was the excavation of the tomb of King Tut in 1922. When the world saw what was hidden in Tut’s burial chamber, it sent just about everyone into a frenzy. Pierre Cartier wrote in 1923 that “the discovery of the tomb will bring some sweeping changes in fashion jewelry.” And he couldn’t have been more right. “Egyptomania” left an indelible mark on all of the major jewelry houses, from Cartier to Van Cleef & Arpels, Boucheron and Georges Fouquet. (Cartier created some of the most iconic jewelry designs that defined this era.)

While a lot of Art Deco jewelry was black and white — the black coming from the use of onyx or black enamel and the white from rock crystal and diamonds — there is plenty of color in jewelry of the era. A perfect accent to diamonds in platinum settings were blue sapphires, emeralds and rubies, and these stones were also used in combination with each other.

Many designers employed coral, jade and lapis lazuli, too. In fact, some of the most important avant-garde jewelers of the period, like Jean Després and Jean Fouquet (son of Georges), would combine white gold with ebony and malachite for a jolt of color.

A lot of the jewelry produced during this time nodded to current fashion trends, and women often accessorized their accessories. The cloche hat was often accented with geometric diamond brooches or double-clip brooches. Backless evening dresses looked fabulous with sautoir necklaces, and long pearl necklaces that ended with tassels, popular during the Edwardian period, were favored by women everywhere, including Coco Chanel.

Find unique Art Deco necklaces, earrings, bracelets and other jewelry on 1stDibs.