Delfina Delettrez

The Nowness website currently features a story about Delfina Delettrez which made me realise I've yet to run my own post on this Italian designer who features in my book.

If there's such a thing as fashion royalty, Delfina is it. Not only is she a 4th generation member of the Fendi dynasty (her mum, Silvia Venturini Fendi, is the brand's accessories director), her dad is the famed French jeweller, Bertrand Delettrez.

Delfina's new My World collection was inspired by the Mayan calendar. Check out the gold 'Hand' bracelet grabbing her wrist by clicking on the top snap.




Photos by Dan Tobin Smith, courtesy of Nowness

A few Delfina facts:

• Delfina decided she wanted to be a jeweller when she discovered a red sapphire among her father’s precious stones and he set it in a ring for her: ‘It was a simple ring but it was very significant to me,’ she says. ‘It was the first ring I ever had.’

• Drawn to all things otherworldly Delettrez channels a fascination with magic and mysticism into her work. Her collections are notable for their enameled and bejeweled frogs, skulls, crowns, flowers, fierce animals and poisonous insects.

• When Delfina launched her debut collection at Colette in 2007, she commissioned her friend, the actress Asia Argento, to write and direct a short film called Delfinasia. The movie featured a heavily pregnant Delettrez and her younger sister at La Canonica – the rural family home that inspires much of her work.

• In 2008 Delettrez opened her first boutique in Rome, in what had previously been an ancient pharmacy. When it came to the decor she plumped for absinthe green accents in order to give her shop the appearance of a witch's house, 'as a tribute to the herbs, tonics and poisons that were once sold there’.

• Her logo – a crescent moon and five stars forming a D – was originally designed by Karl Lagerfeld for her father in the 1980s.

• Delettrez's pieces are all handmade by artisans who use antique jewellery techniques and whose workshops can be found in the streets around her boutique.

Some bibelots from Delfina's previous collections...