During haute couture week in January 2024 in Paris, Boucheron presented the new collection: Histoire de style 2024, the power of couture. Claire Choisne, Creative Director of Maison Boucheron, reinterpreted the couture heritage of Frédéric Boucheron by drawing inspiration from ceremonial clothing such as medals, buttons, embroidery, aiguillettes. Diverted from their primary function, these ornaments are transformed by the virtuoso use of rock crystal and diamonds. A precious deconstruction that highlights 24 pieces of High Jewelry, paving the way for a new vision of couture.
Couture roots
Couture constitutes the timeless foundation of Boucheron’s history. Louis Boucheron, the father of the founder of the House, began his career as a haberdasher in Paris in 1817. In 1822, he transformed his business by specializing in silk, then in lace in 1837, rare and precious fabrics. Frédéric Boucheron, born in 1830, grew up in this environment which undeniably influenced his vision of jewelry creation.
Driven by the incessant quest for delicacy and flexibility, Frédéric worked with gold and stones throughout the 19th century, drawing inspiration from elements borrowed from the art of couture. Claire Choisne explains: “Knots, knits, grosgrain, pompoms, and lace abound in our archives. For this fourth edition of Histoire de Style, I wanted to explore the theme of couture, but without giving in to sentimentality.”
Rethinking ornamentation
To do this, Claire Choisne adopts the prism of formal clothing in order to offer a bold and unique stylistic interpretation. The House’s Creative Director is captivated by the paradox of these outfits. At first glance, ceremonial clothing evokes righteousness and radicality. However, decomposition reveals a sophisticated accumulation of ornaments. The Creation Studio preserved this recipe to design the 24 pieces that form the collection. Claire Choisne adds: “These are attributes of power that I wanted to deconstruct so that everyone can reappropriate them. This collection is designed as a precious kit offering multiple ways to wear it, allowing everyone to create their own style.”
Crystal thread
Far from the flourishes inherent to the genre, “The Power of Couture” focuses on a unity of material (rock crystal and diamonds), whose monochromy attenuates the baroque of these decorations, originally golden, while bringing a visual lightness to the creations.
“The difficulty of this collection lay in giving rigid materials such as gold and stones the characteristics of a fabric,” observes Claire Choisne. Thus, Boucheron artisans manage to transfigure rock crystal and diamonds into jewelry as sophisticated and supple as the rarest silk fabrics.
With the 24 creations of the “The Power of Couture” collection, Boucheron writes a new chapter in the history of High Jewelry and clothing, where jewelry frees itself from the constraints of the material to magnify the substance and multiply the ways of to wear it. The medals, the Tricot or Knot necklace, the buttons and the embroidery illuminated my last week of haute couture and they fit perfectly into the celebration of couture.
