Editor’s Note
A piece of jewelry history returns to the spotlight. Boucheron’s legendary Laurel Leaf necklace, once owned by two celebrated figures, will be auctioned this December after four decades. We examine its storied past and its upcoming sale.
Forty years later, the mythical ruby necklace by Boucheron is returning to auction.
Exhibited in Paris this week, this piece of jewelry, which belonged to Marie-Louise Mackay and Mona Bismarck, is estimated to be worth between 1 and 2 million euros and will be sold by Sotheby’s in New York in December.
Mona Bismarck cried for three days in 1968 when Balenciaga announced the closure of its fashion house. Then, in a single day, she ordered eighty dresses from him. This woman with aquamarine eyes, born in 1897 into a modest family in Kentucky, had become an icon of Parisian elegance. On May 14, 1986, three years after her death, Sotheby’s dispersed her jewelry collection in Geneva for record prices. On December 8 of this year, again at Sotheby’s but in New York, one of her most beautiful jewels returns to auction.
Seven cushion-cut rubies are mounted on a necklace with a garland of diamond foliage.
All elements of the necklace are connected by tiny links that give it a…