Explore Van Cleef & Arpels: Time, Nature, Love Exhibition in Seoul

Van Cleef & Arpels: Time, Nature, Love exhibition opens at the D Museum in Seoul with over 300 stunning jewellery pieces, watches and precious objects on display until mid April 2024

Ready to treat your senses to some jaw-dropping jewellery and precious objects? Tomorrow, the Van Cleef & Arpels: Time, Nature, Love exhibition opens at the D Museum in Seoul. Until 14 April 2024, over 300 jewellery pieces, watches and intricate objects (think powder cases, bags and fragrance bottles) — produced since the Maison's founding in 1906, with loans from private collections and over 90 original archives — congregate for the exhibition. Cue the house's famous Zip Necklace, ballerina clips, Mystery Set stunners, and even a bracelet owned by German-American actress Marlene Dietrich, which is being exhibited for the first time ever.

President and CEO of Van Cleef & Arpels, Nicolas Bos says: "The Time, Nature, Love exhibition was first presented in Milan in 2019-2020. In 2022, it was held at the Power Station of Art, Shanghai’s museum of contemporary art, and in Saudi Arabia at the Saudi National Museum from January to April, 2023. Today we are proud to see it travelling to D Museum, in Seoul, where the Maison already took part in the cultural scene."

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Van Cleef & Arpels: Time, Nature, Love

Time, Nature, Love is curated by Alba Cappellieri, Italian author, scholar and Director of the International Master in Jewelry & Fashion Accessories at Politecnico di Milano, and is conveyed in three sections — you guessed it: Time, Nature and Love. The exhibition is also largely organised according to Italian writer Italo Calvino's Six Memos for the Next Millennium, and Cappellieri chose key concepts through which she assembled the Maison's pieces according to their relationship with time. The Time section, for example, is arranged over 10 sections — Paris; the Elsewhere; five values recognised by Calvino: Lightness, Quickness, Visibility, Exactitude and Multiplicity; Fashion; Dance; and Architecture.

Nature is conveyed through sub-sections of Fauna, Botany and Flora. Last but certainly not least, Love displays symbols and gifts of love from the Maison. Expect scenography that's as arresting as the pieces displayed — designer-artist Johanna Grawunder used pastel lights, inspired by manga, to create a moody, poetic space. She even created a deconstructed, modern chandelier of scattered, dangling acrylic pieces in the Love room. This is one exhibition that very much deserves your time and love, indeed.