by Chiara Spagnoli Gabardi

To mark its 75th Anniversary on New York’s Fifth Avenue, Verdura presents ‘The Power of Style: Verdura at 75,’ a retrospective exhibition featuring over 150 jewels created by the master jeweller Duke Fulco di Verdura.

The exhibit captures the most significant moments and relationships of the Palermitan Duke and is curated by three internationally admired style-makers: Carolina and Reinaldo Herrera, longtime friends of Verdura, and their daughter Patricia Lansing.

Fulco di Verdura began his career working with Coco Chanel in Paris where he created her signature Maltese Cross cuffs. In 1934, Verdura came to the United States to create spectacular jewels for the greatest Hollywood stars, and a virtual Who’s Who of American and European society. His creativity found inspiring collaborators, such as the surrealistic Dalí and jazz legend Cole Porter. Not only wearable jewels were the precious paraphernalia designed by Verdura: chess pieces, objets d’arts, pocket mirrors and fragrance bottles would have the most exquisite materials moulded with elegance and functionality. But amongst the traditional jewels, the sophisticatedly wackiest piece is the laurel tiara designed for Betsy Whitney, created for her audience with Queen Elisabeth II on the occasion of husband John Hay Whitney’s appointment as US Ambassador to the Court of St. James in 1957.

Verdura’s aristocratic disdain for convention led the fashion press to declare him a rebel, style editor of Vogue said: “Fulco’s references to nature, culture and religion keep his work classic. But without question he was a revolutionary, the one who changed everything. Fulco made it all modern.”

‘The Power of Style: Verdura at 75’ will be the most important retrospective exhibition in the history of the company and will be open to the public from October 14 through December 23 at 745 Fifth Avenue, in a new gallery space adjacent to the company’s flagship. The exhibition will feature a selection of more than 150 of Duke Fulco di Verdura’s original jewels and objets d’art as well as a small selection of his 10,000 gouache jewellery designs, archival materials, his personal miniature paintings, and rare period photographs.

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