Vintage Cartier London Birds

Some vintage Cartier birds to wish you a very Happy Easter. Any favourites?

And for those interested in a bit of family background: my grandfather, Jean-Jacques Cartier (last image), loved playing around with the window displays in the #CartierLondon store at different times of year. In the lead up to Easter, he would suggest that Cartier's jewellery designers should focus on designs for bird brooches that incorporated some of the gemstones they had in stock at the time: so an opal could become a kingfisher, a ruby could feature in an exotic bird and chalcedony could be transformed into an owl.

Once #JeanJacquesCartier had approved which designs would become reality, the ones that made the cut were then passed to the #EnglishArtWorks workshop above the #175NewBondStreet showroom where a busy team of talented mounters, setters and polishers would bring them to life. Finally, only after they had passed his stringent quality test (which included them being worn by an employee to check the stones were angled in just the right way to catch the light etc.), it would be time for them to be displayed in the windows…

JJC would create little Spring-themed scenes in his windows to delight those walking past. I can imagine him out on New Bond Street, looking in at the windows, checking and rechecking that the finished look was just right. He was something of a perfectionist! And I'm sure he would have done a much better job at putting a few together for you but here, in his memory, is a little bejewelled trip back in time at Easter.

#happyeaster #throwback #birdbrooch #cartierbird#birdjewelry

Credits (left to right): First row: @s_j_phillips (ruby exotic), @Hindmanauctions (coral and emerald); Second row: @bonhamsjewels (agate & sapphire owl), @christiesjewels(gold and coral hen), @elstobandelstob (emerald, citrine and diamond). Third row: @christiesjewels (opal kingfisher), @1stDibs (gold and spinel robin), @doylenewyork (gold, white chalcedony duck).