When Chanel transforms tweed into jewellery

When Chanel transforms tweed into jewellery

In 2020, thanks to the expertise of its high jewellery workshops, Chanel transformed this famous scottish fabric into a high jewellery collection that was as precious as it was realistic. Three years later, under the impetus of Patrice Leguéreau, the director of Chanel’s jewellery design studio, a second jewellery chapter dedicated to tweed has opened. Isabelle Cerboneschi, Paris

Tweed and Chanel have a history that goes back a hundred years. It was in the 1920s that Gabrielle Chanel discovered Scotland, its rugged landscapes, its changing climate and among all things, its beauty. She was then romantically involved with Hugh Grosvenor, the Duke of Westminster, whom she had met in 1924 in Monte Carlo. Their romance lasted more than ten years. During summer, they sheltered their love affairs away from prying eyes at Rosehall Estate, an imposing building entirely redecorated by Gabrielle Chanel. With its 22 bedrooms, the estate, located in the heart of the Scottish Highlands, has since been abandoned.

To cope with the harsh climate, Mademoiselle borrowed her aristocratic lover’s tweed jackets to protect herself from the wind. The origin of the name of this carded woollen fabric of mixed colours is uncertain: it is thought to come either from the River Tweed, which flows through Scotland and marks the border with England, or from the deformation of the Scottish word “tweel”, meaning twill. Scottish peasants invented this solid, rough material to protect themselves from the cold and damp. Tweed was ennobled in the 19th century when the aristocracy took a liking to spending time in the countryside hunting and fishing. Its colours are inspired by Scottish nature, the golden brown of the moor, the green of the heather, the blue of the Atlantic Ocean, the red of lichen and the purple of elderberries.

Gabrielle Chanel was the first to introduce this gentleman farmer material to the world of haute couture, back in 1924. She collaborated with a Scottish manufacturer who produced her fabrics in the shades of her choice and introduced her first tweeds into her collections. She continued to use this material to create all kinds of garments, from sports suits to day suits and coats. “Chanel, an influential fashion figure whose clothes are at once simple, practical and elegant, is featuring tartan tweed in its latest collections. A few models have already been released for the summer, and others are forthcoming in her autumn collection”, said the October 1927 issue of American Vogue. Tweed became one of Gabrielle Chanel’s signatures.

In 2020, Patrice Leguéreau, the director of Chanel’s Jewellery Creative Studio, drew inspiration from it to create a first collection of 45 pieces of high jewellery entitled Tweed de Chanel. “I wanted to present this fabric that was so central to the Chanel universe, and which became the inspiration for a jewelry collection for the first time. It was a question of laying the foundations, almost literally. While jewelry has often drawn on the codes of couture, it is exceptional for a fabric to serve as the point of departure for a jewelry collection. But ever since I joined Chanel in 2009, I have been fascinated by tweed. One of the first people I met was François Lesage, and I remember him showing me his archives of embroidery and tweed. I was immediately drawn to this material and its history. And I also had squares of tweed woven specially, so that I could examine the fabric in close up and draw my inspiration from it for the second collection”, he explains.

One of the masterpieces of this first collection, the ‘Tweed Couture’ necklace, has been re-edited and entered the Chanel Jewellery Heritage collections in January 2023. This necklace is composed of a multitude of swirls of pink gold and platinum threads and irregular lines set with pink sapphires and red spinels, diamonds and pearls. It is set with a 10.20-carat DIF Type IIa (*) diamond as the centre stone.