Dominique Corlettspeaks to the statement-jewellery designer about the wonders of the cosmos and working with unfashionable materials
HEIRLOOMS OF THE FUTURE
It’s been a busy few weeks for award-winning luxury jeweller Jacqueline Cullen. No sooner had she wrapped up at Goldsmiths’ Fair, where she exhibits every year (this was her 17th), than she was back in the studio completing the first order of her new collection for upmarket London department store Liberty.
Jacqueline’s new collection, Astra-Nova, is the latest evolution in her 20-year career of making glamorous, statement jewellery inspired by elemental energy and the dramatic forces of nature. Volcanic eruptions, lava and jagged cliff edges have influenced her work in the past, but for the last few years she has taken to exploring outer space.
Astra-Nova features bold, chunky signet rings, disc pendants on chains, and thick hoop earrings made from two contrasting but complementary stones laminated together. Brilliant-blue lapis lazuli is paired with icy-blue lace agate; iridescent tiger’s eye with heavily veined green verdite; and the earthy layers of amethyst lace agate with the celestial pink clouds of rhodonite. The rings are set with big faceted gems, while the pendants have a corner that’s been flipped 180 degrees to feature a small slice of the contrasting stone.
‘The initial idea was tears in the fabric of the universe,’ Jacqueline says. ‘If you were to look, is there another world through that tear? It started with the pendants, so there’s a little peek of what’s going on on the other side. That mutated into double-sided things, like when two galaxies collide and create a new universe.’
Jacqueline is best known for jewellery with great visual impact, but the colourful hues of her latest collection are a departure from her usual style. The material she has built her career on is black Whitby jet, often paired with gold and black diamonds. She discovered jet during her Jewellery Design degree at Central Saint Martins, a course she embarked on at the age of 33, having previously spent nine years living on a bus as a New Age traveller, and three years travelling around Central America.
Jacqueline came across jet by chance, finding a small piece among the samples she had picked up at a rock and gem show while looking for inspiration for her final-year collection. Having originally planned to work in black porcelain, she describes the discovery as a eureka moment. ‘Jet is 180-million-year-old fossilised monkey
