• Located at 36 NE 1st St, Miami, FL 33132
  • THE SEYBOLD®
    • ABOUT
      • Lease Retail Space at the Seybold®
      • Over The Years
      • FAQ
      • Go-To Place For All Things Jewelry
      • Instagram
      • Services
      • Motek – Mediterranean Cafe & Restaurant
  • JEWELRY
    • ALL JEWELRY
      • Watches
      • Rings
      • Bracelets
      • Necklaces
      • Earrings
      • Engagement Rings
      • Pins and Brooches
      • Diamonds
      • Gold
      • Precious Stones
      • Pearls
      • Wedding Bands
    • JEWELRY SERVICES
      • Buy Jewelry
      • Sell Jewelry
      • Jewelry Appraisals
      • Jewelry Cleaning
      • Jewelry Diamond Setting
      • Jewelry Engraving
      • Jewelry Financing
      • Jewelry Repair
      • Jewelry Resizing
      • Luxury Jewelry at Wholesale Price
      • Custom Jewelry Design
      • How to pick out an engagement ring?
  • SHOPS
    • STORES
      • First Floor Directory
      • Second Floor Directory
      • Full Directory
      • Shop at Home
      • Brands
      • Jewelry Services
      • Testimonials
  • DIRECTIONS
    • HOW TO GET HERE
      • Via Uber
      • From Miami International Airport
      • From Fort Lauderdale International Airport
      • From Palm Beach International Airport
      • Via Brightline Train
  • NEWS
  • CONTACT
  • Español
SIGN UP

A Parisian Jewelry House Breaks the Mold with a New Watch

Mellerio dits Meller, founded in 1515, introduces its first mechanical timepiece.

PARIS — Mellerio dits Meller has been creating jewelry and precious objets d’art since the Renaissance, giving it a plausible claim to being the oldest jewelry house in the world.

Yet last month, it did something new: The company introduced a timepiece unlike any it had released before — the mechanical M Cut watch.

“It’s our first automatic watch,” said Laure-Isabelle Mellerio, 52, the company’s chief executive and artistic director. Since taking over the direction of the family business following her husband’s death in 2018, Ms. Mellerio has been intent on finding ways to reach a new young clientele; she decided that a high-end watch might appeal.

In recent years, Mellerio has produced watches, but they have all been quartz models. The new collection of M Cut watches, by contrast, boasts a mechanical movement made in Switzerland by one of the expert manufacturers in the watch town of La Chaux-de-Fonds. Ms. Mellerio would not identify the manufacturer, but the movement it produced is a widely used ETA 2000 caliber, which is visible through the timepiece’s open back.

The watch has a date window and is water-resistant to a depth of 30 meters, or almost 100 feet. Prices range from 7,600 euros to 17,600 euros, or the equivalent of $7,760 to $17,975.

As with most of Mellerio’s creations, what’s new has been balanced by what’s historic.

In this case Mellerio tradition is obvious in the watch’s egg-like shape, a form that has been a feature of the house’s watches since the early 1990s. “It’s based on the Beau Sancy,” said Côme Mellerio, 28, the house’s international business manager and the one member of the 15th generation of Mellerios who is working in the family business.

The Beau Sancy, he explained, is a 34.98-carat diamond renown not just for its size, but for its unusual shape. The gem came by its name through one of its early owners — the French diplomat Nicolas de Harlay, seigneur de Sancy. The diamond later became the centerpiece of the crown that Marie de’ Medici wore for her coronation as queen of France in 1610.

While Mellerio did not create the crown or even own the stone (which was last heard of in 2012 when it was sold at a Sotheby’s auction to an anonymous buyer for $9.27 million), the jewelry house has long had special connections to Marie de’ Medici, who played a major role in its history. “On Oct. 10, 1613, she granted Mellerio a license to sell their wares at court,” Ms. Mellerio said.

The queen also Frenchified the jeweler’s name, adding “dits Meller” (meaning called Meller) to its title to associate the jeweler, founded in 1515 in the Lombardy region of Italy, with its adopted home of France.

Today, the Place Vendôme in Paris is known as the home of luxury jewelry and watch houses; Mellerio was the first jeweler to settle in the neighborhood. “When Napoleon created the rue de la Paix, my great-great-grandfather wanted to be the first jeweler to be there,” Mr. Mellerio said.

So in 1815, Mellerio opened its boutique at No. 22. In 1851, the store moved across the street to No. 9 — “the sunny side, so there is more traffic,” Ms. Mellerio noted. The shop has been there ever since, with its workshop in the same building.

Ms. Mellerio got up from her desk in her office at the back of the boutique and pulled a large leather-bound ledger from a bookshelf. She opened the pages, tinged brown with age, to show the design sketches of some of the timepieces — or rather, the bejeweled settings for Swiss-made movements — that Mellerio had created over the centuries. “We also made pocket watches, and bracelets,” she said, and turned to sketches of watches set in bejeweled gold bangles.

In 1993, Mellerio started making wristwatches in the shape of the Beau Sancy, powered by Swiss-made quartz movements. The designs ranged from clean-cut steel cases on leather straps to gold cases with guillochéd dials. One dazzling ladies’ model now on the website is the Medicis Watch, a diamond pavé timepiece priced at €90,000.Image

By contrast, the M Cut models are unisex, Ms. Mellerio said, measuring 36.95 millimeters by 30 millimeters. Cases come in steel, white gold or yellow gold; dials in white, black, navy or silver; and straps in various colors of calfskin or alligator leather with metal buckles that also mimic the shape of the Beau Sancy.

Like the M Cut watches, Ms. Mellerio said, she designed the house’s Muse jewelry collection with a young audience in mind.

“I look at people in the streets, and I see people wearing lots of little necklaces, layering them,” she said. “I want to introduce these young people to wearing Mellerio.” The Muse collection draws on the house’s design motifs — including crosses, blossoms, fleur-de-lis and the ovoid Beau Sancy shape — but in pieces so small and delicate that they appear to be almost sprinkled on gold chains or lightly dusting bracelets, earrings, rings and pins.

A new Muse line, called Riviera, was inspired “by our customers from the 1900s going to the beach,” Ms. Mellerio said, referring to one of the boutique’s display cases containing a preview of the designs, along with some vintage postcards from the South of France. The line is to be introduced officially in September.

Some of the pieces have little emeralds to call to mind the region’s casuarina pine trees, and tiny diamonds “like the foam at the crest of a wave,” she said, set into gold wire that has been bent into the shape of, yes, the Beau Sancy.

By Kathleen Beckett

Are you looking to purchase high-end jewelry? The Seybold® Jewelry Building has the highest-end quality luxury jewelry available. Visit The Seybold® Jewelry Building today, your go-to place for all things jewelry in Miami!

Go Visit

Share

Related posts

January 26, 2023

Make way for the Diva: Bulgari’s watchmaking renaissance


Read more
January 18, 2023

Put a right-hand ring on it


Read more
January 18, 2023

Watches & Wonders 2022: top men’s watches


Read more
January 18, 2023

Beautifully flawed: Pomellato’s Kintsugi jewels break new ground


Read more

The BOLD Life

SPOTIFY PLAYLIST

Shopping at the

Seybold®

ADDRESS

36 NE 1st St, Miami, FL 33132.

HOURS

Mon-Fri: 9:30 AM - 5:00 PM
Sat: 10:00 AM - 4:30 PM
Sun: Closed

CONTACT US



Go to Directory

Search

Categories

  • Bold Life
  • Bold Life Featured
  • Did you know?
  • Events
  • Lifestyle
  • News

Ten floors and over 300 in-house luxury jewelers.

Florida’s premier and full service jewelry center in the heart of Downtown Miami.

NEWSLETTER

Sign up today

  • EnglishEnglish
  • EspañolEspañol
  • THE SEYBOLD®
  • JEWELRY
  • SHOPS
  • FAQ
  • DIRECTIONS
  • NEWS
  • CONTACT
  • How to get there
  • Take an Uber
  • Hours
  • Brands
  • Instagram
  • Jewelry Services
  • Make way for the Diva: Bulgari’s watchmaking renaissance
    January 26, 2023
  • Put a right-hand ring on it
    January 18, 2023
  • Watches & Wonders 2022: top men’s watches
    January 18, 2023
  • Beautifully flawed: Pomellato’s Kintsugi jewels break new ground
    January 18, 2023
  • The hour of the diva: time to shine with Bulgari’s jewelry watches
    December 20, 2022
© 2021 Seybold® Building. All Rights Reserved. Fusco Corporation.
  • THE SEYBOLD®
  • JEWELRY
  • SHOPS
  • DIRECTIONS
  • NEWS
  • CONTACT
  • Español