Welcome to Caroline’s world.
For each edition of the Cannes Film Festival, Chopard copresident and artistic director Caroline Scheufele designs a special collection destined for the red carpet.
While in the past she has drawn inspirations from the world of fairy tales and silver screen classics, this time it’s about her world.
“It’s all that is around me that inspires me. Everything that nature gives us and the universe gives us,” she said, citing inspirations big and small, from celestial bodies in the cosmos to one very special spaniel.
Scheufele’s own pet, Byron, is the star of the collection and a popular mascot of the festival itself. “He’s my good luck charm, and he knows how to walk the red carpet,” she said of the 8-year-old Cavalier King Charles who often accompanies her to black-tie events, including the Trophée Chopard gala dinner.
In the collection, Byron is featured on a ring made of white, black and cognac diamonds totaling 6.37 carats, as well as rubies and pink sapphires. He sat for portraits ahead of the project to ensure the rings were an adorable likeness, and the eyes are set with onyx.
“He was really posing,” she said, comparing Byron to Karl Lagerfeld’s cat Choupette, who has starred in several ad campaigns. “I said, ‘Byron, you’re gonna have to work now. It’s not just about cookies.’”
Each year Scheufele adds another piece to the collection, so the number corresponds to as many years as the festival has been celebrating cinema on the Croisette. This year it totals 78 pieces and is a rich collection with varied designs.
“It’s a challenge for the atelier, but they love it. It’s always very worth it when you get to see a red carpet look,” she said of the 40 artisans in the Geneva workshop. “Cannes is really the place to launch something.”
Scheufele’s love of animals continues in the collection with a rotund hippopotamus — which Chopard calls “delightfully plump” — in the form of an 18-karat ethical white gold ring pavéd with 17.38 carats of brilliant-cut gray diamonds and garnets. The eyes are set with onyx.
Bringing themes together, a 7.25-carat black diamond panther lounges across a crescent moon in ethical 18-karat white gold pavéd with 8.88 carats of white diamonds.
“The collection is very colorful, like our planet,” she said, speaking from Switzerland where she takes inspiration from gardens on the shores of Lake Geneva. “All the flowers are coming out now and I don’t know how many shades of green are outside.”
Inspired by the flora, Scheufele also brought in blooms in the creation of flower earrings in titanium featuring white opal cabochons, pavéd with pink and yellow sapphires, as well as rubies, and a rose brooch in ethical 18-karat rose gold pavéd with 54.83 carats of rubies.
In addition to the red carpet jewelry collection, Scheufele will present her Caroline’s Couture fashion lineup, which is designed to highlight jewels.
She launched the fashion line with a splashy runway show in Cannes two years ago, which brought Naomi Campbell, Helena Christensen, Eva Herzigova, Petra Nemcová and Natalia Vodianova — alongside Byron — to the catwalk.
Just days before the latest edition of the film festival was set to open, Scheufele visited the atelier in Italy, where her nascent collection is crafted.
“I came back and said, ‘I hope the high jewelry is up to the couture,’” she joked.
The two are created to be symbiotic, with the dresses designed to complement the client’s jewels — Chopard and otherwise.
“It goes hand-in-hand with the high jewelry creations,” she explained.
Now when she designs high jewelry, such as the red carpet collection, she also considers what gown or dress could work well with a piece. “The silhouettes highlight the jewelry.”
Backed by a design team in Italy, Scheufele said the line is expanding quickly with several couture clients. Next stop is Paris, where she hopes to open a Caroline’s Couture showroom in the near future, and launch made-to-measure services with Bergdorf Goodman in the U.S.
Bringing her universe full circle, Scheufele’s love of couture is demonstrated in pieces that recall delicate dressmaking materials, including a timepiece framed with finely open-worked lace made of diamonds, and topped by a lozenge-shaped, portrait-cut diamond in lieu of a traditional sapphire crystal on a satin strap.
Another lacework piece is a choker with a 17.25-carat oval-shaped pink-purple tourmaline, set atop a scalloped ribbon of 19.41 carats of emerald-cut pink sapphires, 9.91 carats of marquise-cut amethysts, and completed with 32.26 carats of brilliant-cut diamonds.
Chopard is also closely associated with the heart symbol, which it has long used in its Happy Hearts collection. The shape has been updated in a ruby ring, as well as a necklace and earring set featuring interlacing briolette-cut pink sapphires and diamond brilliants.
Another key piece is a showstopper of a choker centered with a 129-carat emerald cabochon. The gem is surrounded by 28.85 carats of pear-shaped and 21.56 carats of brilliant-cut diamonds, set in ethical white gold.
Cinema is, of course, one of her driving passions, and Chopard has been an official partner of the festival since 1998.
“There’s never one Cannes like another,” she said, of attending the film festival for nearly three decades. People ask if she ever gets tired of the Croisette and the circuit. “Of course, I get physically tired because it’s not one night like the Oscars, but there’s always something so vibrant.”
She recalled meeting former film festival president Pierre Viot.
“I said, ‘you know, my real job is not organizing dinners and events. My real job is designing,'” she recalled. She told Viot that she could make the award “more glamorous, more precious,” and left with one under her arm and permission to rework it.
“That’s how we ended up in Cannes, with cinema, which is part of my universe.”
The red carpet collection was launched to celebrate Chopard’s 10th anniversary in Cannes, and Scheufele has come up with new inspiration each year. With 79 pieces to design next year, she is already playing with ideas — which she is keeping closely under wraps.
Scheufele reminisced about her first Cannes, when she was also gifting another Swiss specialty in addition to showcasing the brand’s jewelry. “Everybody thought we were making chocolate. It was very funny. Now, down the road, there’s a whole machine going into action. Sometimes I miss the bohemian days when I could go to the cinema and watch a movie,” she relayed.
Instead, Scheufele will preside over several nights of Chopard festivities, including the Trophée Chopard gala, which honors emerging actors each year. This edition will see Finn Bennett and Marie Colomb receive the award from godmother Angelina Jolie.
Still, her most important moment is the closing ceremony, for which Chopard also designs the winning prize. “It’s all about the Palme d’Or. It’s the heart of the festival,” she said, comparing it to big awards ceremonies that hand out several statues. “Don’t forget, there’s only one.”
