Platinum is a dense, white-grey metal that occurs in minute quantities in certain nickel and copper ores. It was known to European metallurgists from the mid-eighteenth century, but its extreme hardness made it very difficult to work by conventional goldsmithing techniques. Melting platinum requires temperatures far above those used for gold or silver, and the tools and skills needed to shape it into fine jewellery settings were simply not available in most workshops until the late nineteenth century.
Louis Cartier's decision to adopt platinum as the primary metal for Cartier's fine jewellery, at a time when almost no craftsman could work with it, was not a conservative step. It required finding and training specialists, developing new tools, and committing to a material that was expensive, technically demanding, and unfamiliar to clients accustomed to yellow gold or silver settings.
Why Platinum Changed Jewellery Design
The reasons for the shift become clear when you understand what the metal allows. Platinum's strength means that very thin sections of it can hold stones securely. In gold or silver settings, the metal has to be present in greater volume to provide structural integrity: thicker claws, heavier bezels, more substantial mounts. In platinum, the settings can be reduced to an almost skeletal form while still holding firmly.
The consequence for design was substantial. A platinum setting could hold diamonds in arrangements that resembled fine lace or embroidery rather than a metal structure with stones attached. The diamond becomes the point of the design; the metal recedes, becoming almost invisible. This is the aesthetic principle of the Garland Style: the impression of diamonds suspended in air, the setting present but barely noticed.
The White Metal and White Stones
Platinum's colour also matters. Yellow gold settings, however thin, impart a warm tint to the stones above them. White stones cut in the period before platinum, particularly diamonds and rock crystal, were often mounted in silver to avoid this tint, but silver tarnishes. Platinum is white like silver but does not tarnish and is far stronger. Pale stones, colourless diamonds especially, sit above platinum without acquiring a yellow cast.
This made platinum the natural partner for the diamond-intensive jewellery of the Belle Époque and the Edwardian period. Tiaras, stomachers, rivieres, and the great parures of the early twentieth century used diamonds as the primary visual material; platinum was the invisible framework that made this possible.
Later Periods
The First World War temporarily interrupted the supply of platinum for jewellery: the metal was requisitioned for industrial and military uses. During this period, white gold was developed as a substitute. After the war, platinum returned, and Cartier continued to use it through the Art Deco years for the geometric, high-contrast pieces that are among the most recognised Cartier designs. It remains the standard metal for the finest Cartier jewellery.
Sources
- Francesca Cartier Brickell, The Cartiers (Ballantine Books, 2019), ch. 2 (“Louis, 1898–1919”) and ch. 5 (“Stones Paris: Early 1920s”)
- Hans Nadelhoffer, Cartier: Jewelers Extraordinary (Thames and Hudson, 1984; revised 2007), pp. 39, 45 et al.
- Wikipedia: Platinum in Cartier Jewellery
