| 16 January 2000
New Millennium Gold
World Gold Council, with the co-operation of the Vicenza Fair, is delighted
to present a spectacular collection of gold jewellery to celebrate this
New Millennium. The collection, which has been created by 123 celebrated
companies from the gold jewellery sector who are internationally recognised
and considered by the Council to be amongst its most esteemed partners,
will be exhibited at VicenzaOro 1 from 16 to 23 January 2000.
The New Millennium Gold Collection
The Council is committed to encouraging product innovation and to
promoting attractive collections which capture the attention of the 'innovators'
- those social groups who best know how to anticipate trends, appreciate
creativity in design and are the force which drives the gold jewellery
business. The collection will be launched at VicenzaOro 1, the first gold
jewellery fair of the new millennium and the centre of attention for the
most qualified of buyers, who come from over 100 countries around the
world. The New Millennium Gold collection will be unveiled in a stunningly
effective exposition space which zigzags over an area in Pavilion F of
more than 300 square metres.
The Jewellery - somewhere between Reality and Cyberspace
The collection has been inspired by the design book 'Gold Trends 2000'
and comprises the most innovative stylistic trends in contemporary gold
jewellery design. Italy has the lion's share of the exhibition with 72
leading names on display, including several companies which are participating
in a collective exhibition organised by the Council for the very first
time. France follows, with 16 manufacturers, then come the United Kingdom
with 13 participants and the United States with 12; Portugal can count
7 manufacturers, Spain 2 and one company represents Greece. The associates
of Emagold have made a valuable contribution in the creation of these
items of jewellery, the most progressive collection on the global scene.
This spectacular event is supported by a multi-media tool - a CD-Rom
featuring the entire New Millennium Gold collection, together with contact
data and a profile for each participating company. It has been created
with the most innovative buyers in mind, those who seek quality in gold
jewellery design. The CD-Rom can be used both as an effective guide to
new products and as a valuable aid to merchandise planning. It will also
be distributed to the international press - it contains a folder of high
resolution images showing every piece of jewellery in the collection,
each accompanied by a brief description. Your appointment with the latest
trends in jewellery worldwide will continue in cyberspace: the website
address is
www.new-millennium-gold.com
The Trends
The Pleasure of Luxury
As the tendency towards minimalism draws to a close, we see evidence
of the re-emergence in the new millennium of decorativeness, ornamentation
and a prevalence of yellow gold. In this highly technological age, luxury
is no longer synonymous with ostentation but with ingenious combinations
of technology, creativity in design and the craftsman's skill. Italy,
the country which sets the trend for design throughout the world, is the
starting point for the aesthetic revolution - and there is one item of
jewellery which expresses this new trend perfectly: the choker. This item
is present in the New Millennium Gold collection in all its variations:
enhanced with 70 fine silk-finished golden threads, with cascading diamond-cut
chains, with interwoven golden wires and in the form of a feather, which
sensuously embraces the neck. Or again, there are chokers formed from
gold wire wrapped into a spiral, some as fine and delicate as lace and
yet others with a strong visual impact, made up of dense but minuscule
links, reminiscent of the chain mail of medieval times.
The Threads and the Fabrics of Gold
The intricate and extraordinary effects of the most luxurious fabrics
are interpreted here with great creative flair by the gold jewellery designers.
Pieces delicate as lace, with the lightness of tulle and the exquisite
grace which only the goldsmith's art can confer - this is the essence
of the new jewellery. We see in this collection not only fine silk-finished
golden threads, but also hollow tubing with Florentine finishing to make
up chokers, bracelets and earrings. There are sinuous forms, linking Italian
with American designers. Wires are intertwined, knotted and twisted; the
jewellery is frequently silk-finished and there is a succession of yellow
and rosé gold. There are rings made up of eight threads of green, yellow
and white gold, and bangles, double-banded in yellow gold. Then there
is a shawl, formed of the softest gold mesh. This 'fabric-style' workmanship
is usually the result of patented research carried out by the individual
companies. The effect created by the flexibility and softness of these
links feels very seductive against the skin.
A Place between Tradition and Innovation
The code for the new millennium is a 'fusion' of styles, of expressive
language and of cultural inheritance. The gold jewellery industry maintains
the priceless traditions of the past, such as granulation, chiselling,
embossing, hammering and ethnic gold and, with the aid of technology,
rephrases them, grafting these ancient working methods onto an avant-garde
style of design. Inspiration has been taken from the Orient, including
Japanese culture, from ancient Etruscan and Roman jewellery, from the
splendour of the Renaissance period and from Celtic traditions - all of
which have been stylistically reinterpreted for the 21st century. The
traditional use of three colours of gleaming, highly polished gold is
applied to cyber-trend bangles in solid, powerful shapes, some with geometric
designs. In the wake of the delicate, feminine and intuitive values which
are pervasive in international design, comes a craft which characterises
this collection: hand-finishing with silk surfaces, at times enriched
with arabesques or with a damask effect.
For Play and for Pleasure
Movement and playfulness, modularity and reversibility; there are reversible
bracelets which can be worn either in white or yellow gold, chokers with
a thousand raindrop charms, chains whose length can be chosen as desired,
intricate rings with parts to be fitted together. Along these lines, there
is also jewellery created with elements inlaid, marquetry-style, like
precious jigsaw puzzles, a bracelet inspired by a puppy's paw-print, a
pendant imprisoned like a genie in a crystal bottle, sculpted rings in
the form of cacti - small, medium and extra large - and a bracelet with
concertinaed sheets of gold folded into a perfect work of origami. Then
there is a necklace inspired by sunflower seeds, a bracelet depicting
golden coffee beans, two crescent moons which make up a pair of earrings
- all, fittingly, in 24 carat yellow gold.
World Gold Council's aspirations for the New Millennium Gold jewellery
are that it should become a stylistic reference point for gold jewellery
designers everywhere and for the collection to be celebrated by international
buyers and consumers all over the world.
For further information, please contact:
New Millennium Gold Stand
VicenzaOro 1, 16 - 23 January 2000
Tel: +39 0444 969 481 /2
Daniela Invernizzi/Christine Consonni
Tel: +39 02 5831 5913
Fax: +39 02 5831 8367
E-mail: daniela.invernizzi@flashnet.it |