Van Clef & Arpels ballet story

‘Spanish Dancer’, 1941. Van Clef & Arpels ballet story

Van Clef & Arpels ballet story
Since the introduction of Claude Arpel and George Balanchine, held in 1961, resulted in the creation of the famous ballet “Jewels” by jewelry house Van Clef & Arpels. The jewelry house is strongly associated with iridescent emeralds, rubies and diamonds ballerinas. However, sparkling brooch in the form of delicate ballet dancers appeared on the shelves of boutiques much earlier – at the beginning of World War II. And since then, Van Clef & Arpels repeatedly returned to this theme. As a result, appeared the whole “ballet story” lasting more than half a century.

‘Spanish Dancer’, 1941. Van Clef & Arpels jewelry house

One of the first ballerina brooches was ‘Spanish Dancer’, created in 1941, then followed Ballerina brooches in 1943, 1946, 1947, 1952. Those were difficult times of the Second World War in Europe, but American clientele of jewelry house had money and a desire to decorate their everyday lives. Therefore, new dancers appeared with the same popularity. Theme of Ballet is presented not only in the brooches, like this jewelry box, for example, displayed at Van Cleef and Arpels jewelry house.

Ballerina Dancer set and timepiece. Van Cleef and Arpels

Necklace with detachable ballerina brooch and watch with her image were released in honor of the opening of the boutique brand Van Cleef & Arpels in Hong Kong.
In 2007, in honor of the 40th anniversary of Balanchine’s ballet, Van Cleef & Arpels released a whole collection dedicated to this event. It’s called – “Precious Ballet” (Ballet Précieux).
Moscow boutique has a rich collection of the dancers. Apparently inspired by the success of the previous project, the jewelry house made a special art collection dedicated to ballet, popular in Russia. It is sold only in Moscow. The collection is constantly updated. So in 2012 in honor of the opening of the Moscow boutique jewelry house in Stoleshnikov were created two brooches, based on “Swan Lake” – Odette and Odile.

Incidentally, the “Jewels” – not only ballet associated with Van Cleef & Arpels. In 2013, the French choreographer Benjamin Millepied, in collaboration with Van Cleef & Arpels staged the ballet “Reflections”, which will be part of the trilogy “Jewels”. Brooches about this event produced by jewelry house are beautiful.