Audemars Piguet transposes its Royal Oak into high jewelry pieces
With its new Royal Oak High Jewellery collection, Audemars Piguet translates the design codes of its iconic timepiece into a suite of cuffs, chokers, and earrings. Drawing inspiration from the landscapes of the Joux Valley while embracing a bold, distinctive style, the collection featuring gold, precious stones, and intricate textures and reliefs establishes an aesthetic language all its own.
The Royal Oak: From Watch to Jewel
Since its creation in 1972, the Royal Oak model has continually demonstrated the full potential of its design. Conceived by Gérald Genta, this steel sports watch shook up the small world of horology, establishing its architectural lines, octagonal bezel, and integrated bracelet as the hallmarks of a timeless timepiece. More than just a design, it introduced a highly recognizable silhouette, defined by surfaces that alternate between satin-brushed and polished finishes, geometric volumes, and a dynamic interplay with light.
The new Royal Oak Joaillerie collection extends this legacy by transposing its distinctive elements into the realm of high jewelry. Developed by Audemars Piguet and co-designed with Nathalie Barzilay, the collection adapts the iconic architecture of the bracelet characterized by its tapering links and octagonal studs to serve as the centerpiece of each piece, allowing the jewelry to assert its own unique identity, independent of the watch. The approach is compelling: rather than simply setting an existing icon with gemstones, the manufacture has distilled its core DNA and applied it to these new creations. Consequently, the proportions, finishes, and assembly techniques have evolved into signature elements of the jewelry itself. “Frosted Gold,” in particular, offers a fresh perspective on this geometry. Conceived and created in 2016 by Carolina Bucci, this finish achieved by hammering the gold with a diamond-tipped tool imparts a shimmering, “snow-set” effect, which is further accentuated by the contrast of mirror-polished studs.
This strong adherence to the codes of the Royal Oak represents both the strength and the limitation of the project. While it certainly ensures an immediate coherence between the pieces and their horological heritage, it also raises the question of their “autonomy”: to what extent can a design as recognizable as this one evolve without simply feeling like a rehash of the same core idea? Audemars Piguet finds part of the answer in its use of materials and gemstones, which significantly alters the perception of the design motif from one creation to the next.
The Joux Valley in stone and light
Through the lines of the Dream of Joux and Risoud Eclipse collections, the manufacture translates its Jura surroundings into exquisite, high-value creations. This artistic vision seeks to weave landscapes, atmospheres, and shifting light into the very structure of the jewelry.
The cuff bracelets evoke ice formations, foliage, flowers, or the colors of a night sky. On the “Blue Moon” model, white diamonds, Swiss Blue and London Blue topazes, and blue sapphires form a gradient of stones in varying cuts and sizes an arrangement designed to evoke the Moon and a starry sky. The “Tree of Life” model, meanwhile, depicts a tree with foliage composed of a gradient of cognac-colored sapphires and tsavorites.
The Risoud Eclipse pieces take on a more raw aesthetic. The necklace and cuff combine blackened titanium with sugarloaf-cut cabochon emeralds, framed by diamonds. These green stones featuring carefully cut and polished conical facets emerge from a dark backdrop, evoking the Risoud forest beneath a darkened sky. The contrast is striking, while the interplay between satin-finished surfaces and polished chamfered edges enhances the depth of the design.
The Dream of Joux tie-style necklace takes the art of high jewelry even further: it brings together 42 pear-cut diamonds of 1.5 carats each, complemented by two additional stones of 5 and 3 carats, as well as 1,670 blue sapphires set in a “snow-setting” style across blue titanium links. The effect is spectacular, yet it relies on more than just the sheer volume of the stones. The sapphires juxtaposed so closely that they entirely cover the links and their mountings transform the piece into a continuous, colorful surface, while the pear-cut diamonds create a luminous cascade.
Distinctive jewelry
In addition to these High Jewelry pieces crafted on commission or as one-of-a-kind creations the collection includes cuffs and chokers fashioned from “Frosted Gold,” available in white, rose, or yellow gold. More directly linked to the original design language of the Royal Oak, these pieces emphasize surface texture and the way the metal catches the light, rather than an abundance of gemstones. They offer a more graphic interpretation of jewelry.
Frosted Gold Autumn Mist Cuff – €71,400
Frosted Gold Spring Frost Cuff – €71,400
Frosted Gold Summer Haze Cuff – €71,400
This diversity of offerings is welcome. It ensures that the collection is not reduced to a mere succession of exceptional pieces.
By reconnecting with a history of jewelry-making that dates back to the 19th century, Audemars Piguet highlights the shared passion for precision, metalwork, and gemstone setting that unites both Haute Horlogerie and Haute Joaillerie. With this new collection, the manufacture reinterprets the codes of the Royal Oak in a different vein, where the geometry of the bracelet serves as the unifying theme for these sculptural creations.
Frosted Gold Autumn Mist Choker Necklace – €101,200
Frosted Gold Spring Frost Choker Necklace – €101,200
Frosted Gold Summer Haze Choker Necklace – €101,200
THE AUDEMARS PIGUET ROYAL OAK JEWELLERY COLLECTION WEBSITE
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