Suzanne Belperron

 ‘My style is my signature’

With these immortal words, the trailblazing female designer Suzanne Belperron perfectly summarised her unparalleled oeuvre. Her distinct flair, artistic sensibilities and original vocabulary of motifs, immediately render her works recogniseable to the discerning eye. Throughout her almost fifty year-long career, Suzanne Belperron created some of the most stylish and innovative jewels of the 20th century. Belperron’s work is characterised by a well-balanced use of volume, sleek lines and unusual colour combinations, as exemplified by the important suite of sapphire and emerald jewels presented on the following pages. 

Suzanne Vuillerme (1900-1983) was born in the French village of Saint-Claude in the Jura mountains, only a short distance from Geneva. She studied drawing at the École des Beaux Arts in Besançon, before finding employment as a draftswoman at the Parisian jeweller René Boivin in 1919. At the time, Boivin was run by René Boivin’s widow Jeanne, who recognised Suzanne’s talent and was very encouraging of her artistic development. At Boivin, Suzanne contributed greatly to the artistic style that became synonymous with the house during the 1920s and early 1930s. 

In 1924, she married the ingenieur Jean Belperron whose surname she adopted professionally. Belperron left her employment at Boivin in 1932. Together with her associate Bernard Herz, she founded her own company based at 59 rue de Châteaudun, with reception rooms decorated by her friend Marcel Coard. Belperron had an exclusive relationship with the workshop Groëné et Darde, later Darde et Fils. With no signatures and designs that defied contemporary trends, workshop marks are frequently relied upon to confirm a piece's authorship and approximate date of manufacture. Belperron's clientele included some of the most fashionable and influential ladies of her day, such as the Duchess of Windsor and Diana Vreeland. 

Suzanne Belperron ceased her activities after a long and prosperous career in 1974. From the late 1980s onwards, her designs saw a great resurgence amongst collectors and scholars. In May 2012, Sotheby’s Geneva had the privilege of offering her personal collection of jewels for sale.