The Ballad Of East And West

While Feng.J might love to wander around her adopted city’s Jardin des Tuileries in quiet contemplation, its blooms bear only mild resemblance to her hyperreal gem-encrusted floral creations, learns MELISSA PEARCE

- Melissa Pearce

CHINA-BORN JEWELLER Feng.J has been shuttling between studios in Shanghai and Paris since establishing her eponymous label in 2016. The latter is the seat of her young jewellery house’s dexterity, where each piece is created with consummate precision by some of the city’s best artisans. Serendipity, in the form of an introduction by an esteemed colleague, led her to her chief craftsman: A respected master who had settled into an atelier within a classic Haussmann building near Place Vendôme as a young man.

Binding to this fine foundation is the 32-year-old’s astute design eye accrued during her time at the London College of Fashion (University of the Arts London), where she pursued a master’s in jewellery design; when she was an assistant jewellery and accessories designer at Alexander McQueen; acquiring her GIA/GG certificate from the Gemological Institute of America, as well as stints at the Gübelin Academy in Switzerland.

More than one European underpinning of her approach is clearly installed but the Chinese aesthetic also weaves itself among the inspirations and photos on her studio walls. Her home territory was the first to notice her talent in 2015, when a piece of Feng.J jewellery achieved the record for highest sales by a Chinese jewellery designer in the history of Poly Auction (Hong Kong).