Visions of Verdura
July 2006
Coco Chanel commissioned a treasure trove of jewels from Verdura, a slight Sicilian duke, while screen sirens Greta Garbo and Marlene Dietrich regularly donned his acclaimed creations. Today Fulco Santostefano della Cerda, Duke of Verdura (1898–1978) remains revered for his captivating jewelry, whose prices are climbing globally.
Verdura, as he was known, lived a storybook life. Raised among the Palermo aristocracy, he sought new horizons early, leaving his ancestral Sicilian home for Paris in the mid-1920s with the
intention of becoming a painter. But Chanel, who was already making waves on both sides of the ocean with her trail-blazing couture, recognized his talents and hired him as a textile designer. Under her aegis, the Parisian transplant quickly turned to creating distinctive jewelry. “Chanel was the most chic woman I ever met and the first person to ever take me seriously,” Verdura once declared.
This novice jeweler quickly rejected the restrictions of the prevalent Art Deco style, with its emphasis on hard-edged geometry and the limiting penchant for aligning glittering diamonds with only platinum. Instead, he took his own jewelry designs in radical new directions, drawing on the high points of art history, natural history and contemporary art as well. “As a jeweler, he embraced bold color, scale and form, while employing a range of new stones and combinations, like setting diamonds right next to massive tourmalines,” says Michael Coan, chairman of the jewelry department at Manhattan’s Fashion Institute of Technology.
Verdura also looked to his roots for inspiration: the Sicilian baroque, the lush gardens of his ancestral home and a fondness for his family’s menagerie of exotic pets, such as baboons. With extraordinary prescient style, Verdura translated those sources into bouquets of violets made up of chunky amethysts and cunning animal brooches like cavorting kittens clutching balls of luminescent pearls or poodles flecked with twinkling pavé diamonds. He also was drawn to marine motifs, searching the sea for actual forms, such as scallop shells. (“Only he embellished them with gold, diamonds and coral,” notes Coan.) His artistry also extended to incorporating found objects, such as specimen rocks and pebbles; he even transformed shells and stones by wrapping some in delicate gold netting. “Above all, he had the best eye for incorporating nature,” Coan says.
Verdura’s finely tuned sense of art history is reflected throughout his oeuvre. For example, he created diamond Hokusai-like stylized waves, Raphael-like angels and Byzantine mosaic-like brooches. Among his earliest signature styles are his Maltese cross brooches and wrist cuffs, which Chanel personally favored. And he took traditional motifs, like the heart, in entirely new directions. For example, he massed chunky rubies into a heart shape then tied them with strands of diamond ribbon and a bow at the top.
But having found fame in Paris, Verdura moved on to greater challenges in the United States, where he quickly signed on with jeweler Paul Flato in Hollywood. There, he designed Katharine Hepburn’s jewelry for “The Philadelphia Story” before leaving to found his own firm in Manhattan in 1939 with the backing of Cole and Linda Porter.
His distinctive designs were worn by the style-setters of those times: Vogue editor Diana Vreeland wore his Maltese cross cuffs; Babe Paley, his 21.25-carat canary diamond ring; Clare Booth Luce, his brooch of comedy and tragedy masks; and Betsy Whitney, his tiara, which was akin to an Indian headdress, only in gold and diamonds. Among the Hollywood set, actresses Paulette
Goddard, Greer Garson and Carole Lombard sported his designs. Most renowned are the gold-and-platinum cigarette cases he created to commemorate Cole Porter’s opening nights on Broadway.
The increasing awareness of Verdura wares—and the corresponding ascending prices—is due in part to Ward Landrigan, the former head of Sotheby’s USA jewelry division. When he established his own Manhattan firm in 1973, Landrigan acquired the Verdura company with its vast archives of designs. Today, Landrigan offers vintage Verdura in a salon-like setting high over Fifth Avenue and sells new renditions of Verdura designs. Many notables of fashion, design and royalty, such as Mario Buatta, Albert Hadley and Princess Michael of Kent, acclaim Landrigan’s creations. “What I love about Verdura jewelry is that it is timeless,” says Oscar de la Renta. “From the time Fulco worked with Chanel his work has always had a tremendous sense of style and identity.”
Verdura’s distinctive jewels find fans throughout the world as his auction prices can attest. For example, Daphne Lingon, Christie’s New York jewelry specialist, notes that his painted ivory figure of a dutiful soldier sitting atop a camel from an 18th-century chess set soared from its $8,000 to $12,000 estimate to $47,800 at the auction house’s sale of the late heiress Doris Duke’s jewelry in June 2004. “He painted and trimmed the soldier with jewels for a glamorous effect,” says Lingon, who adds that the figure probably cost $400 when it was made in 1940. And even his less-elaborate pieces command serious prices. A pair of onyx and sapphire earrings (each one a carved onyx seashell, enhanced by cabochon sapphires and gold trim) surpassed their $4,000 to $6,000 estimate to realize $9,600 at Christie’s New York last April. “But then that is the power of Verdura,” Lingon says.
Verdura, as he was known, lived a storybook life. Raised among the Palermo aristocracy, he sought new horizons early, leaving his ancestral Sicilian home for Paris in the mid-1920s with the
 |
Maltese cross bracelet, 1937, |
This novice jeweler quickly rejected the restrictions of the prevalent Art Deco style, with its emphasis on hard-edged geometry and the limiting penchant for aligning glittering diamonds with only platinum. Instead, he took his own jewelry designs in radical new directions, drawing on the high points of art history, natural history and contemporary art as well. “As a jeweler, he embraced bold color, scale and form, while employing a range of new stones and combinations, like setting diamonds right next to massive tourmalines,” says Michael Coan, chairman of the jewelry department at Manhattan’s Fashion Institute of Technology.
Verdura also looked to his roots for inspiration: the Sicilian baroque, the lush gardens of his ancestral home and a fondness for his family’s menagerie of exotic pets, such as baboons. With extraordinary prescient style, Verdura translated those sources into bouquets of violets made up of chunky amethysts and cunning animal brooches like cavorting kittens clutching balls of luminescent pearls or poodles flecked with twinkling pavé diamonds. He also was drawn to marine motifs, searching the sea for actual forms, such as scallop shells. (“Only he embellished them with gold, diamonds and coral,” notes Coan.) His artistry also extended to incorporating found objects, such as specimen rocks and pebbles; he even transformed shells and stones by wrapping some in delicate gold netting. “Above all, he had the best eye for incorporating nature,” Coan says.
Verdura’s finely tuned sense of art history is reflected throughout his oeuvre. For example, he created diamond Hokusai-like stylized waves, Raphael-like angels and Byzantine mosaic-like brooches. Among his earliest signature styles are his Maltese cross brooches and wrist cuffs, which Chanel personally favored. And he took traditional motifs, like the heart, in entirely new directions. For example, he massed chunky rubies into a heart shape then tied them with strands of diamond ribbon and a bow at the top.
But having found fame in Paris, Verdura moved on to greater challenges in the United States, where he quickly signed on with jeweler Paul Flato in Hollywood. There, he designed Katharine Hepburn’s jewelry for “The Philadelphia Story” before leaving to found his own firm in Manhattan in 1939 with the backing of Cole and Linda Porter.
His distinctive designs were worn by the style-setters of those times: Vogue editor Diana Vreeland wore his Maltese cross cuffs; Babe Paley, his 21.25-carat canary diamond ring; Clare Booth Luce, his brooch of comedy and tragedy masks; and Betsy Whitney, his tiara, which was akin to an Indian headdress, only in gold and diamonds. Among the Hollywood set, actresses Paulette
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Shell brooch (Hokusai- |
The increasing awareness of Verdura wares—and the corresponding ascending prices—is due in part to Ward Landrigan, the former head of Sotheby’s USA jewelry division. When he established his own Manhattan firm in 1973, Landrigan acquired the Verdura company with its vast archives of designs. Today, Landrigan offers vintage Verdura in a salon-like setting high over Fifth Avenue and sells new renditions of Verdura designs. Many notables of fashion, design and royalty, such as Mario Buatta, Albert Hadley and Princess Michael of Kent, acclaim Landrigan’s creations. “What I love about Verdura jewelry is that it is timeless,” says Oscar de la Renta. “From the time Fulco worked with Chanel his work has always had a tremendous sense of style and identity.”
Verdura’s distinctive jewels find fans throughout the world as his auction prices can attest. For example, Daphne Lingon, Christie’s New York jewelry specialist, notes that his painted ivory figure of a dutiful soldier sitting atop a camel from an 18th-century chess set soared from its $8,000 to $12,000 estimate to $47,800 at the auction house’s sale of the late heiress Doris Duke’s jewelry in June 2004. “He painted and trimmed the soldier with jewels for a glamorous effect,” says Lingon, who adds that the figure probably cost $400 when it was made in 1940. And even his less-elaborate pieces command serious prices. A pair of onyx and sapphire earrings (each one a carved onyx seashell, enhanced by cabochon sapphires and gold trim) surpassed their $4,000 to $6,000 estimate to realize $9,600 at Christie’s New York last April. “But then that is the power of Verdura,” Lingon says.
For More Information
Bonhams & Butterfields, San Francisco. (800) 223-2854.
Christie’s, New York. (212) 636-2000.
Doyle New York. (212) 427-2730.
Sotheby’s, New York (212) 606-7000.
Verdura, New York. (212) 758-3388.
Wynn & Company, Las Vegas. (702) 770-7100.
Verdura: The Life and Work of a Master Jeweler by Patricia Corbett (Abrams, 2002).
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