It’s all in the wrist
James Sherwood
CUFF-LINKS
Private Eye didn’t need to caption the pictures of a gaunt, pinched Peter Mandelson — bittersweet smile playing about his pursed lips — as his Cabinet comeback was announced. The bubble above his head could only have read, ‘The bitch is back’. That glint in his crocodile’s eye, reminiscent of a longforgotten soap actress contemplating a return to prime time, said it all.
Similarly, a fellow’s cuff-link is a silent but eloquent indication of status and taste. As Paul Dyson, curator of the definitive 2006 Goldsmiths’ Hall ‘On the Cuff’ exhibition told me, ‘Every properly dressed person wears cuff-links. The correct link at the correct occasion still positions you in life’s game.’ While a minimal silver bean by Elsa Peretti for Tiffany (£180) signifies a winner, anything in enamel involving teddies, dice or mini mastiffs places you firmly at the bottom of life’s snakes and ladders board.
The paradox in purchasing a handsome pair of cuff-links is not dissimilar to the state of post-cable television: thousands of options and still nothing that appeals. For the lion’s share of men shopping alone, choice is the enemy, hence the popularity of the stealthy 18-carat gold oval. Though unimpeachably smart, it says little about the man. A motherof-pearl four-leaf clover link from Van Cleef & Arpels’ Alhambra collection is no less discreet but suggests a depth of knowledge and appreciation of fine jewellery to those who know.
‘The French cuff is literally a blank canvas, and is the only opportunity for men to wear pieces signed by the great jewellers such as Cartier, Van Cleef and Fabergé,’ says Sotheby’s head of jewellery Joanna Hardy. ‘What’s interesting about the cuff-link is that the value of the materials is practically zero, so the value is in the design and craftsmanship alone.’ Such is the desire for antique links that Hardy says they never, ever remain unsold at Sotheby’s.
At the collector’s end of the market, the auction houses and specialists such as Wartski, S.J. Phillips and Sandra Cronan compete for increasingly rare signed masterpieces. ‘You really want the mad and the bad when acquiring important signed cuff-links make by the great jewel houses,’ says Wartski MD Geoffrey Munn. ‘Nothing boring has any value at all for those who appreciate exquisite jewels.’ Wartski is the home of impossibly rare and precious links, as evinced by a pair of diamond and enamel Fabergé Easter eggs commissioned by the last Tsar’s mother in 1907, hand-painted in Nicholas’s cuff-link inventory. Though Munn demurs from ballyhooing prices like a Berwick Street market fruit-seller, he will say that a pretty if relatively modest pair of Fabergé links in the store today would clear £4,000 if not signed by the house. As Fabergé, they leap beyond £40,000. With the Tsar’s prov enance, the sky is the limit.
Currently residing at Wartski is an exquisite Giuliano gold and enamel Renaissance revival oval link (c.1875) inspired by a jewel in the British Museum that Munn says ‘you could wait a lifetime to find again’. The embarrassment of riches in the window of S.J. Phillips somewhat obscures the fact that you’re seeing the finest jewellery cuff-link designs of every period from 1890 gold ovals with horseshoe motifs described in turquoise, emerald, sapphire and diamond to 1950 Buccellati mosaic links of Pavé precious stones set as fine as a Hilliard miniature.
Equally pleasing is the sight of contemporary cuff-links made by the giants of the jewellery world as finely crafted as these archive pieces. It always pays to play to the house style when buying from an old master. In Van Cleef’s case, it is the ingenious ‘mystery setting’ of rubies and sapphires in white gold dress links (from £5,000). For Cartier, it is a Deco-inspired white diamond and onyx cufflink echoing the house’s iconic black and white panther spots (£10,800).
It is a testament to Graff that jewelled cufflinks set within the last 20 years already appear at Sotheby’s. Stars currently in the Bond Street flagship store include an invisibly set table of squareand baguette-cut diamonds (price on application) and an exquisite sapphire and diamond surround link (£20,000) as fine as golden age Deco jewels.
Fashion houses, meanwhile, having finally cottoned on to the profitability of one-size-fitsall, have launched themselves into diamond links like a leggy chorine eyeing-up a fat producer. The temptation — rarely resisted — is to cast one’s logo in sterling silver and roll it in Pavé diamonds. The horror! Much smarter is an oblique reference to the fashion house such as Hermès’s Mors de Filet snaffle link (£395), Gucci’s sterling silver bamboo bar (£160) or Louis Vuitton’s silver and lacquer checkerboard ‘Damier’ square (£250).
Wit and simplicity is a serendipitous combination in a cuff-link. Cartier casts a common
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knot cuff-link in 18-carat yellow, white and rose gold for the Trinity cuff-links (£1,575). Bottega Veneta’s famed Intrecciato woven leather is cast in silver bar links for couturelab. com. Architect Frank Gehry’s ingenious gold ‘open fish’ spirals (£600) for Tiffany are simplicity itself and slip in and out of a Turnbull & Asser double-cuff like a hot knife through butter, while Alfred Dunhill’s 18-carat gold shields (£1,565) are the most elegant shape on which to engrave one’s cipher.
Wit and wildness is acceptable in a link should the man live up to the promise on his cuff. None but the brave sport Boucheron’s white gold and diamond ‘Trouble’ coiled serpent link (£8,150) with emeralds for eyes or Theo Fennell’s 18-carat yellow gold skull entwined by a diamond snake. Stephen Webster’s bestselling links are casts of gurning, malevolent puffa fish, chameleons and gargoyles. It is art pieces such as these that expose the man with button cuffs as one of life’s losers.
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