Disco never dies, especially if you’re the daughter of rock royalty. Just ask Jade Jagger, who creates jewellery designs with edgy, rock and roll touches.
You can take the girl out of the disco, but you can’t take the disco out of her. Jade Jagger should know: She’s the only daughter of ’70s poster couple Bianca and Mick. And as a teen, she hung out with her mother’s Studio 54 posse that included artists Andy Warhol and Ross Bleckner, who all treated her like a “shared child”.
So when it comes to finding inspiration for her new collection, the 42-year-old turned to one disco icon: the mirror ball. The signature Disco Diamonds line in Jagger’s namesake label is a flamboyant take on this. Earrings, pendants and bangles et al are adorned with mini disco balls and fully covered in diamonds or precious gems like rubies and sapphires. “Disco is unifying. All is one under the mirror ball,” says Jagger, who even says she has a disco ball above the pool of her Ibiza home.
The fine jewellery designer also credits Cartier and Georgian-era jewellery as her major influences, and describes her work as “deluxe, bohemian and rock and roll”. And her designs reflect this: earrings in the shape of cobras, skull-shaped beads and lapis lazuli beaded necklaces are just a sampling for this season.
Still it’s not just in jewellery design where she’s establishing her own name; her resume comes with serious cred. Property developer John Hitchcox and designer Philippe Starck courted her as an interior designer for their design company Yoo. Among the projects she has done for them are residences in New York and Mumbai, as well as the Baglioni Hotel in Marrakech. Other notable tie-ups with the Jade Jagger stamp: the US$250,000 (S$317,593) 18K white gold dagger-shaped ice pick for Belvedere vodka and a new flacon design for Guerlain’s flagship perfume Shalimar.
In 2000, royal jeweller Garrard appointed her as its creative director. That high profile move essentially turned the posh brand into a household name in Britain. Want proof of Jagger’s magic touch? The wing designs she introduced during that seven-year stint remains a best-selling line for the brand today.
It was also there that Jagger started working on a signature design that pervades her own jewellery line today: the arrow. The Arrows collection, with its gold-plated or sterling silver pieces, is her way of blending romance (“like a delicate flight from Cupid’s bow”) with her own “rebellious edge”.
Her pieces made their Singapore debut in January at jewellery retailer Bycanary at Level 1 Tangs Orchard. Bycanary’s director Lum May Yee says: “We are always on the lookout for jewellery that’s a bit edgy, and her lineage has broadened her horizon, (giving rise to) her creativity and a sense of rock and roll evident in her designs.”
The launch adds to Jagger’s three existing standalone stores in London, Goa and Ibiza, and presence at leading stores such as Bergdorf Goodman and Barneys. Priced from $190 for a bracelet to $1,990 for a pair of earrings with diamonds, her designs are big on gold, coloured stones and that hippy vibe.
The Arrow range is Jade Jagger’s way of doing romantic (Cupid’s arrow, geddit?).
The heavy use of gold in Jagger’s jewellery harks back to her years as painter in the ’90s. Then, she used plenty of powdered pigments and gold leaf. Her flair for painting started young and Andy Warhol personally tutored her in that aspect. “I taught her how to colour and she showed me how to play Monopoly,” he once quipped.
It was during her time as a painter that she wanted to branch out to jewellery. “I wanted to go on a more sculptural, three-dimensional voyage and explore femininity. Working with jewellery and adornment allowed me to do that,” she says.
Today, her studio is located in the hippy outpost of Goa in India’s west coast, where artisans handcraft and finish every piece by hand. This exposure to fine jewellery-making encapsulates her attitude towards jewellery. As she puts it: “Precious metals and stones are truly magical for me. I appreciate costume jewellery, but it’s not the real thing and nothing can beat that.”
This article was originally published in Female June 2014.
