Elsa Peretti

Elsa Peretti
Born	(1940-05-01) 1 May 1940 Florence
Education	Volpicelli School, Rome
Occupation	Jewelry designer, philanthropist, fashion model
Website	www.nandoperettifound.org

Elsa Peretti is an iconic jewelry designer and true philanthropist, as well as a former highly sought fashion model.

Early life

Elsa was born in Florence, Italy on May 1, 1940, as the youngest daughter of Nando Peretti and Maria Luisa Pighini. Her father Nando Peretti (1896-1977) was a distinguished businessman who built Anonima Petroli Italiana (API) into one of Italy’s leading oil companies.
Educated in Rome and Switzerland, Elsa initially made her living teaching Italian and working as a ski instructor in the Swiss mountain village of Gstaad, before moving to Milan in 1963 to pursue a degree in interior design and to work for the architect Dado Torrigiani.
One year later she decided to embark on a new career path as a fashion model. After having spent her first couple of years in Barcelona, she followed Wilhemina model agency’s suggestion to move to New York in 1968. While walking under the limelight of Manhattan’s most prestigious catwalks, she soon discovered her true passion for jewelry design and began creating new styles for a handful of top fashion designers, i.e. Halston, Oscar de la Renta, Giorgio di Sant’Angelo and, since 1974, exclusively for Tiffany & Co. In 1999 Elsa explained how it all started to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution: "In 1969, I found a tiny flower vase in a junk shop and was inspired to design a bottle on a chain for the designer Giorgio di Sant’Angelo", before she went on to design belts for Halston – whose minimalism was a touch stone for Peretti.
By the time Elsa joined Tiffany & Co. as an independent designer, she had already received the 1971 Coty Award for her "extension of jewelry into the realm of fashion sculpture" and had her first appearance in Vogue. In 1972 Bloomingdale’s, one of New York’s landmark shopping stores, opened a dedicated Peretti boutique.

Tiffany & Co.

″Mention the name Elsa Peretti and jewelry aficionados everywhere will nod their heads in approval. After all, the world-renowned jewelry designer – who is synonymous with Tiffany & Co – has given the world a wealth of designs that have come to stand as emblems of timeless elegance.″

After joining Tiffany & Co., a company which has enthralled the world with its distinctive Blue Box, Elsa started to create iconic jewelry collections which to this day are a mere reflection of her own credo that beauty lies in the simplicity. In 1974, the year she joined Tiffany & Co., her first collection, featuring "sinuous", "sensual", and "sculptural" shapes and forms, debuted, already causing a true sensation in the accessories world. She has brilliantly expanded the materials and repertory of jewelry, blending the modern tradition with ancient craftsmanship from different regions and cultures. Most importantly, Elsa’s distinctive approach is characterized by the stylization of natural and organic forms such as bones, beans, hearts, apples, snakes teardrops and starfish. In the 1990 Elsa Peretti catalogue: Fifteen of my Fifty with Tiffany, Richard Martin observed that "a transcendental aspect haunts Peretti’s work; she hints at our affinity to nature even as she plucks the perfect form from the cartload of nature’s abundance and art’s options. Peretti returns us in her absolute objects to the Garden of Paradise. There, all from has its lingering memory and every shape is the definitive best".

Though based on real things, these unmistakable designs evoke subtle abstractions and have brought a fresh attitude to jewelry, while setting the stage for a truly new era in American design. Although Elsa Peretti’s designs are rendered in a variety of materials, including the latest launches in rose-gold, she is best known for her works in sterling silver, which over the past 40 years have elevated the precious metal to a new heights in popularity in jewelry. To this day, her revolutionary Diamonds by the Yard, Open Heart and Bone Cuff collections are a testament to her ingenuity and design expertise. Other pieces like the Bottle and Mesh designs continue to fascinate people around the world many years after having been introduced. The unique quality of Elsa’s designs was wonderfully captured by Kate Betts, editor of TIME Style & Design. "I think Elsa actually designs for herself, which is what makes her jewelry so personal and attractive to people. Elsa’s style and personality are all over her work, and that is what woman look for in jewelry. They want to relate to and understand who has created this piece." On her 25th anniversary with Tiffany & Co., the jewelry company established the Elsa Peretti Professorship in Jewelry Design at the Fashion Institute of Technology, in recognition of her remarkable career and as the first endowed professorship in the history of the FIT. In 2001 Elsa Peretti was presented with an honorary Doctor of Fine Arts degree from FIT. In further tribute, Elsa’s jewelry case in Tiffany’s flagship store on 5th Avenue in New York was designated a Tiffany landmark . Michael J. Kowalski, Chairman of Tiffany & Co., amalgamates the enrichments that have been brought about by Elsa’s inspirations to Tiffany & Co. by simply confirming, that "the day Elsa Peretti became part of Tiffany & Co., was the day we entered a new era in our history of design innovation". In December 2012, after having worked together for 38 years, Tiffany & Co. and Elsa Peretti extended their partnership for another 20 Years, making sure that her timeless designs will remain accessible for the many, old and new, fans for the years to come.

Permanent Collections

British Museum

In 2009 the British Museum acquired 30 of Elsa’s iconic creations for its 20th century collection.

The British Museum describes Elsa’s capacity to produce objects, which come from different parts of the world as unique, noting that they combine "superb craftsmanship and symbolic meaning in a modern age".

The display is called "Continuity and Change", highlighting the museum’s wish to show cross-cultural influences and techniques. It clearly demonstrates that the collaboration between Peretti, her artisans and Tiffany is an example of excellence in contemporary design based on an international cooperation.

In addition to the British Museum, Elsa Peretti’s designs are also in the permanent collections of the following museums:

• Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, Massachusetts
• Museum of Fine Arts in Houston, Texas
• Indianapolis Museum of Art, Indiana

Catalonia, Spain

In 2013, Elsa was the first non-Catalan person to be awarded the National Culture Award by the National Council for Culture and the Arts (CoNCA). She has had links with Catalonia since the 1960s and has had established relations with artists of her generation. She has provided a great deal of support to cultural, scientific, humanitarian and educational initiatives and for human rights through the Nando and Elsa Peretti Foundation and through the Spanish Elsa Peretti Foundation, always combining past and present, tradition and innovation. Through the Elsa Peretti Foundation she has promoted the visual arts and fostered the consolidation, protection and dissemination of the historical, artistic, cultural, architectural and craft heritage of Catalonia. In the last year she has worked on projects such as the renovation of the interior of the church of Sant Martì Vell, the management of the sixteenth-century historical documents of the town, the conservation of the photographic archive of Oriol Maspons and the conservation of the Roman city of Empúries.

Philantropy

The Nando and Elsa Peretti Foundation (NaEPF)

Elsa Peretti developed over time an active concern over the future of our planet. In this process, two major challenges stand out as the core of her struggle to give concrete help to our future: the defense of environment and the empowerment of children through the protection of their right to education and health. At the beginning of the new millennium, she established what she considers the most ambitious achievement of her life, which is putting together a staff of motivated people to form a charitable foundation able to take up these challenges: The Nando and Elsa Peretti Foundation.

A major pillar of the NaEPF philanthropic strategy consists in projects aiming at the promotion of human and civil rights, with a special emphasis on the right to education, children's rights, and women's rights and dignity. Over time, The NaEPF has also supported the requests of unrepresented people, and oppressed minorities for the defense of their right to exist and the preservation of their culture.

Furthermore, every year an important part of the Foundation’s endowments are destined to the promotion of physical and mental health. A large number of medical and scientific research projects have been financed through dozens of grants in partnerships with some of the most important Italian and International Universities and Research Institutes. For the same purposes, the Foundation also supports more specific types of intervention, such as the building of entire hospitals or sanitary facilities, and the purchase of technological and medical equipment in advanced, as well as poor countries.

The Foundation’s commitment for issues concerning the environment and wildlife conservation has remained unaltered over time, funding several public awareness campaigns, and projects for the conservation of endemic species.

Over the past few years, the Foundation has also become increasingly engaged in the promotion of culture and the arts. From individual scholarships granted to talented artists, to the funding of public exhibitions and concerts, and to the recovery and restoration of ancient artistic works; today, the number and typology of activities in favor of the arts is on the increase.

Awards

Among the most prominent recognitions to her career, there are the:

• American Fashion Critics Coty award, 1971;
• President's Fellow award, Rhode Island School of Design, 1981;
• Fashion Group "Night of the Stars" award, 1986;
• Cultured Pearl Industry award, 1987;
• Council of Fashion Designers of America's Accessories Designer of the Year, 1996.
• Elsa Peretti Professorship In Jewelry Design: In 2001, Tiffany & Co. established the Elsa Peretti Professorship in Jewelry Design. On the occasion of the 25th anniversary of its successful and rewarding collaboration with Elsa Peretti, Tiffany & Co. created a perpetual fund for faculty salary support in the Jewelry Design Department. At Ms. Peretti’s request, the endowment is established in honor of her long friendship and professional association with Samuel Beizer, founding chairman of FIT’s Jewelry Design Department.
• 2013 The National Prize of Culture by the Catalan Government, which is awarded annually to individuals or organizations that have distinguished themselves for their outstanding contribution in their respective cultural areas.
• 2015: Guardó JORGC (Col·legi Oficial de Joiers, d'Orfebres, de Rellotgers i de Gemmòlegs de Catalunya) en reconeixement a la trajectòria global

Honors

• Grande Ufficiale, Ordine al Merito della Repubblica Italiana (Order of Merit of the Italian Republic)
• Grand Cross pro Merito Melitensi (Order of Malta)
• Honorary member of the Circolo di San Pietro

Exhibitions

Notable exhibitions include:

• Fifteen of My Fifty with Tiffany, Fashion Institute of Technology, New York, 1990;
• Retrospective, Tiffany's stores worldwide, 2001
• British Museum: display in Room 2 of Peretti-designed jewellery, accessories and tableware from Tiffany & Co., 2009

Design milestones

The most celebrated pieces of jewelry design by Elsa include:

• Diamonds by the yard
• Open Heart
• Cuffs
• Bean Pendant
• Bottle Pendant
• Carved Green and Black Jade
• Carved Rock-Crystal Beads
• Flatware Padova
• Aegean Chain
• Snake
• Mesh Bra
• Mesh Necklace
• Water Pitcher
• The Equestrian Belt
• Wire Bangle

External links

• Elsa Peretti at the Fashion Model Directory
• www.nandoperettifound.org
• www.tiffany.com/WorldOfTiffany/TiffanyStory/Design/ElsaPeretti.aspx
• www.britishmuseum.org/about_us/news_and_press/press_releases/2009/peretti.aspx