POETRY IN MOTION

An immersive London exhibition takes visitors on an enchanted journey inside the watchmaking world of Van Cleef & Arpels

-  HANNAH SILVER

A new London exhibition is celebrating the fantastical horological world of Van Cleef & Arpels, where fairies and ballerinas flit over watch dials, diamond moons rise and gold suns set, and flowers wave gently in the breeze.

 The exhibition, entitled 'Poetry of Time', traces the early days of the maison, following Estelle Arpels' marriage to Alfred Van Cleef in 1895, which signalled the beginning of a distinctive aesthetic that blurred the lines between high jewellery and watchmaking.

Crafts such as the 'mystery set' technique, where diamonds appear to hover without the aid of visible settings, and the transformable zip necklace - which actually zipped set a sharply technical tone.

This jewellery heritage, when married to a watchmaking savoir faire, went on to define the aesthetic of the timepieces.

Romance reigned, from the jewelled birds perched on a 1949 table clock to spectacular high jewellery automatons.