'Luxury' once denoted stuff that was costly and hard to obtain. The noun bespoke well-upholstered and Gatsby-esque lives played out against a backdrop of mansions and servants and among others who, as Holly Brubach once observed in The New York Times, "ordered their trunks from Louis Vuitton, their trousseaux from Christian Dior, their Dom Perignon by the case."
Carriage-trade luxury went south a while ago, and with it went the carriage trade itself, says the New York Times. On the way out, it passed a new class of people who — although they might never be able to afford an apartment at 740 Park Avenue or a summer place in Dark Harbor — had acquired both the ability and the hankering to purchase themselves little nothings from Vuitton, Chanel or Dior. And thus, even in a recession, the client most crucial to luxury goods purveyors is no longer a Rockefeller but a Real Housewife of New York.
That may account for the decision made by Cartier, the 163-year-old French jewelry house now owned by the Richemont group, to take a populist tack when celebrating its U.S. centenary. Gathering baubles commissioned over the last century by the celebrated, the rich and the swell, Cartier has installed them in its Fifth Avenue flagship for "Cartier...100 Years of Passion and Free Spirit in America," opening May 1, a rare chance for the hoi polloi to get a close look at how the other half once lived.
"Cartier is a true luxury brand," Frederic de Narp, president and chief executive of Cartier North America, said one week ago, adding that "there is no fashion at Cartier, there are no seasonal products. There is just the timelessness of something valuable cherished for generation after generation." Yet like most of its competitors, Cartier long ago expanded its scope to include perfume and eyewear, stuff that lacks the recherche glamour of an emerald parure but that does a lot for a company's bottom line.
It is true that people are left in the world who recognize where to go when they suddenly find themselves in need of a diamond tiara, but they are few. Even before the economy got Madoffed, the pool of clients had dwindled for the sort of baubles the ultrarich once bought to amuse themselves. And so, particularly at a time when strapped consumers are questioning both their buying habits and the durable value of last year's "It" bag, there is a certain pleasure to be gained from ogling the keepsakes of boom times, when people with plenty of money — but also time and taste — dropped into Cartier when they felt the itch for a jeweled card case.
Borrowed from clients, estates or else the vaults of Cartier's Swiss archive, the show is replete with objects like the Duchess of Windsor's lorgnette and the diamond-and-panther brooch created for the Woolworth heiress Barbara Hutton. There is a bracelet of carved emeralds and rubies made for Ganna Walska, the marginally talented opera singer whose genuine gift was marrying well and often — six times. There is the jeweled handbag that Condé Nast's wife had engraved with her home address, 1040 Park Avenue, in the possibly delusional expectation that it would be returned if ever mislaid.
And among the other giddily refined oddments is Mary Pickford's vanity case, Mrs. Cole Porter's tutti-frutti dress clips, J. P. Morgan's perfume bottle, the Triple Crown trophy, Mrs. Vanderbilt's jeweled car travel case and Grace Kelly's poodle pin. From Elizabeth Taylor's legendary trove is a ruby-and-diamond suite that her husband Mike Todd gave her — at poolside, as captured on a film clip that is part of the show. Also there is La Peregrina, a pear-shaped pearl that was discovered in the early 16th century, owned by Mary Tudor and the Spanish queens Margarita and Isabel, and purchased at auction in 1969 by Richard Burton for $37,000. Cartier set it with diamonds, pearls and rubies in 1972.
"We are all about stories at Cartier," said de Narp, an assertion seconded by Taylor herself. "Of course I wear my jewelry!" the actress said in an e-mail exchange. "I wear the important pieces as well as the simpler ones that I love as much." Wearing an exceptional gem "gives me a real high," she added, and playing with jewelry is among her preferred pastimes, "because each piece tells a story, taking me back to a special person or time or place." Stones have a life of their own, said Taylor, whose authority on the subject is incontestable. "There's something mystical about them. They have their own vitality."
Cartier and other luxury-goods houses, de Narp said, "are in a defining moment because people are disoriented and need reassurance," by the economic downturn. "They need something rock-solid," he added — like rocks.
