Sophie Buhai unveils dreamy design-led jewellery pieces for a Parisian gallery

In the exhibition Jewelry Objects, Sophie Buhai unveils a dreamy bespoke collection of design pieces at Galerie Anne-Sophie Duval, a Parisian space flanking the Seine that neighbours the Dries Van Noten store and the Beaux Arts de Paris. The newly reopened gallery recently underwent a renovation masterminded by French architect/designer Sylvain Dubuisson.

Los Angeles-based Buhai—known for making shapely earrings and stone necklaces—launched her namesake jewellery brand in 2015. Her collections have been featured in the Cooper Hewitt Smithsonian Design Museum and the Georgia O'Keeffe Museum, as well as at retailers like Dover Street Market and 10 Corso Como. Everything is made in Los Angeles. 'We do our production, our design, our fulfillment, everything happens there', she says. 'It feels old world.' She works daily in her studio alongside her husband (who has a business role) and a small team.

Jewelry Objects (on view until 30 June) spans 20 unique or limited-edition pieces, each bearing her delicate signature (literally, with a subtle, delicate flourish). 'These pieces are contemporary, but they're influenced by different moments in design history,' Buhai says. Within the gallery, Buhai’s creations dialogue with pieces selected by Blum: nesting tables in red lacquer by Katsu Hamanaka and a parchment and lacquer pedestal table by Marcel Coard. 'The gallery is really known for Art Deco, from the 20s up until probably mid-century', Buhai says. 'Jean Michel Frank, Pierre Chareau, Rose Adler, Eileen Gray, Jean Dunane - these designers I've studied and are my inspirations.'

Buhai notes she started coming to Paris regularly 10 years ago, multiple times a year, to show her collections, 'and that was really an education for me… because you’re exposed to a level of beauty that is really only in Paris in this particular way' given that the decorative there are celebrated and taken seriously.

Some of Buhai’s pieces required collaborating with up to four different craftspeople. 'When you don't have to worry about a particular price range or how time-consuming a technique can be on a piece because you're only making one or three of them, what you can do is very uncompromised.' There were silversmiths and lapidaries Buhai had had a long relationship with from working on her main collection. But she scouted an artisan based in North Carolina who trained in traditional urushi lacquer methods in Japan, a technique that yields a beautiful finish: 'it's like 40 coats from the lacquer tree. It's very labor intensive and time-consuming”—but! 'There’s a depth that comes from all the layers.' The most complex piece to execute was a silk-tasseled minaudière with a magnetic closure in black urushi lacquer (it resembles a small creature or 'a third eye').

Moreover, there’s a sterling silver cigarette holder wound with silver thorns and a pendulous drop of blood in garnet ('very goth'). There’s a tiny hand mirror on the flip side of Black Onyx hand-carved wooden shell with a freshwater pearl and an 18 karat gold vessel ('sort of surrealist'). There are 'lighters that fit just like an American BiC' adorned with 'really good lapis—beautiful, vibrant blue'. The jade and sterling silver cigarette holder fits 'Capris or Vogues, or you can put your joints in there'.

'I love the idea of taking these mundane, everyday objects and making them like a fantasy', Buhai says of rethinking items such as a comb or a magnifying glass. However, her pieces lean more vice than virtue: 'We were joking that these are naughty objects: there's the lighters, the cigarette holder, the flask, the knife… there’s a little darkness,' she says. 'There are pill boxes—in chalcedony, Carnelian, lemon quartz—and so they're beautiful on a table, but you could put them in your evening bag, or on your vanity.'

The ornamental nature of the pieces relative to their functionality is always a thin balance: No one would want to put Buhai’s elegant sterling silver toothpick (contained in case with a jade top and 18 karat gold) between their teeth, presumably? “I wouldn't say it's something you use every day, but if you're going to an elegant dinner and you need a toothpick, it's a conversational piece to pull out.' For her Carnelian and onyx flask: 'This you could put in your handbag for a fun night out, or you put it on your bar, and it just looks really beautiful.'

A silver cup, one of two, prominently features rainbow moonstone. 'It's used a lot in New Age jewellery, but I was interested in how you could really elevate it and make it quite refined”, she says. Given the mainstreaming of astrology and spirituality, it seems very culturally resonant. 'It's sort of hand in hand with wellness', Buhai acknowledges. 'All of these stones that I'm using—rock crystal, carnelian, lapis, jade—are all stones that have been used in ancient amulets and talismans, in antiquity and Middle Ages, Renaissance, Ancient Egypt, up to Art Deco, the 70s… and then they kind of fell out of fashion. But I think it's something innate in us that's attracted to these stones, that feels protected or powerful when we bring them near us.'

As for her own jewellery habits? 'This is quartz,' she says extending a ringed hand. 'It feels like you're wearing a crystal ball around your finger… This is my lucky piece.' Suspended around her neck is a simple onyx pendant: 'I love taking a raw stone and carving it into a sculptural shape and wearing it.' She notes: 'Sometimes I don't wear anything if I'm in the studio and I just want to be comfortable. But it definitely depends on your mood and what you're you want to express that day.'

Jewelry Objects is at Galerie Anne-Sophie Duval until 30 June

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