In Rome, water cavorts across courtyards, cascades through aqueducts, bursts from the mouths of stone gods, and pirouettes from ledges with such theatrical flourish that it feels directed by a stylish deity. As part of Fendi’s centenary celebrations this year, Delfina Delettrez Fendi, the house’s artistic director of jewelry, has channeled that baroque bravura into Eaux d’Artifice, a collection that glimmers with movement, illusion, and the surreal lyricism of the Eternal City’s fountains.
The name isn’t incidental. Eaux d’Artifice pays homage to Kenneth Anger’s obscure 1953 short film of the same name. Shot in the misty fountains of Villa d’Este (the estate near Rome, not the hotel in Lake Como), the experimental 13-minute film has long had a devoted following among cineasts and occultists. It shows a tiny woman in 18th-century dress haunting a landscape of hydraulic jets and stone spouts. “Honestly, I don’t even remember where I first saw it,” says Delettrez Fendi. “It was just one of those visual memories that live quietly in your mind.”
When Delettrez Fendi started thinking about her designs, the imagery suddenly came back to her, unbidden but luminous. In the finished pieces, there are no literal references to the plot of Anger’s short—because it doesn’t have one. Rather, the film is a poetic translation of a heady Arcadian atmosphere. “It’s a choreography of water,” says Delettrez Fendi. “It doesn’t need to explain itself. It moves, and this is what I also wanted the jewels to do.”
The idea of heritage was also front of mind when Delettrez Fendi was designing these one-of-a-kind baubles, given the house’s special anniversary. Ancient techniques have pride of place: the use of rock crystals as magnifiers and mood enhancers, the asymmetry of stones set off-center. “Maybe it’s not on trend,” says Delettrez Fendi of the collection, “but it’s beautiful.” What Eaux d’Artifice ultimately captures is not just Rome’s opulence, but its sense of mystery. “Rome is a surreal theater of water and light,” she muses. “It’s always performing.”
Lead image clockwise from top: Bettmann; Courtesy of Fendi; Sepia Times/Universal Images Group via Getty Images; © 1953 Estate of Kenneth Anger, Courtesy of Brian Butler; Bettmann; Victor VIRGILE/Gamma-Rapho via Getty Images.
