Somewhere Between Architecture and Jewelry

Abstract

Our projects talk about knowledge and experience accumulated through time, so they work like powerful memory boxes. All that information reappears when we start sketching our first exploratory drawings. Architecture always influenced the way we see and understand the world and things in general, the “real” architecture which surrounds us every day, but maybe in a particular way the imaginary one that we can discover through set design projects, ephemeral exhibition design, even visionary drawings related to unbuilt ideas. We aim to demonstrate that jewels and architecture can share fundamental principles. When we look at a jewellery piece, we can observe its volumetric, how does light and shadow model the piece, the scale, the contrast between full and empty spaces, the composition, the sense of horizontality or verticality, its symmetry or asymmetry, its ergonomics, among other aspects but how can we relate to this intriguing object, what kind of emotions can it arouse in us? Perhaps we can play with similar feelings in other scales. In this perspective, our article focuses on the relation between architecture and jewellery applied research considering the philosophy “learning-by-doing” pursued by Charles and Ray Eames, inspiring and timeless references from the past. We follow a design methodology that implies continuous research about other authors and movements, the continuous selection of waste objects and materials, the development of sketches along with all the processes, and experimental prototyping. On the other hand, we incorporate specific goals related to product sustainability since the beginning of the present projects, namely upcycling. The main goals transversal to these experimental series consists of exploring space as a concept, interaction, and, at last, wearability. The jewel itself can have a strong presence in a certain way very close to the artwork but it is created and materialized for real people so we prefer to think about it as design because it is supposed to be owned and appropriated by someone and to contribute simultaneously to communicate their personality, to break with typified and mass fashion design, to conquer an immaterial dimension, to provoke emotion the moment we “dress” it.