Alix Dumas: Crafting the Magnificent Magnolia Brooch
August 16, 2023
Alix Dumas: Crafting the Magnificent Magnolia Brooch
"From the picturesque French town in Brittany where she lovingly handcrafted her Magnolia brooch, to the glitzy Couture show in Las Vegas where she won first place in the Haute Couture category, Alix Dumas has been on a breathtaking journey.
Dumas’s miniature sculpture featuring diamonds, spinels and sapphires in gold, recycled silver, and titanium is a tour de force in 12 by 10 centimeters. The French designer wanted to interpret the flower — a delicate symbol of rebirth — by using innovative technology and the techniques she’s honed over the years.
“This piece really shows the specialties of my craftsmanship, all the technique of lace that I make in metal using patterns, but in very thick layers to enhance the inherent volume of the piece,” she explains.
Alix Dumas Magnolia brooch featuring a central diamond, spinels, sapphires, diamonds, set in Fairmined gold, recycled silver, and titanium. (Maison Alix Dumas)
Playing on light and textures, the jewel displays an artistic selection of colors — among them the gradient-shaded spinels from Vietnam and the larger diamond she sourced from Antwerp-based Fima Diamonds to match the rose gold. The use of anodized titanium for its coloring and weight was equally intentional. As for silver, “I love working with [the metal] because I can work with it in very thick layers,” says Dumas. “It weighs much less than gold, so I can have bigger volumes for less weight, and it blackens with diamonds.”
Setting the stones. (Maison Alix Dumas)Setting the stones. (Maison Alix Dumas)
While her husband lent a hand to the coloring work on the titanium, the jeweler worked on all other aspects of her creation, including positioning every single gem — though she left the task of pushing the metal in to the setter.
“I want the stones to be so close that there is no metal left except for only two or sometimes three beads,” she states. “It’s a very selective setting, very high-end. But this way, you really have the color come out, and the metal is almost nowhere to be seen except in the places where I want it to be seen.”
The Magnolia brooch will soon be getting a “little sister,” using gems from the same batch of stones but in a different palette. The award-winning piece contains spinels that run from pink to the first shades of purple, while the smaller jewel will range from very light pink to a deeper violet. “They will go together, but not be the same vibrancy,” Dumas says.
Alix Dumas. (Maison Alix Dumas)Alix Dumas. (Maison Alix Dumas)
A LIFE OF ART
Alix Dumas’s penchant for handicraft started young: She recalls making tools as early as three years old, but turning her skill into a career didn’t seem like an obvious path.
“I’ve always worked with a lot of different materials,” she says. “Any time I saw something, I would try it. But in my family, there are no artists who live [off of] their artistic work. And it was very difficult for me to accept that this could be a living.”
After university, however, her desire to work in a museum didn’t survive the realization that she would spend more time behind a computer screen than making art. At age 23, she decided to study at a contemporary jewelry school in Paris — more to give herself some time to reflect on a future career than as a definitive field of practice, but it didn’t take long for a passion to kindle.
“When [the course] started, I realized that I had just found my medium, that it was what I wanted to do,” she remembers. At the end of the two-year program, she presented her final project to a jury of professionals, among whom sat a master jeweler who would become her first employer.
Her subsequent training at his workshop in the south of France gave her the opportunity to work on each piece from start to finish — an unusual practice for a contemporary jewelry atelier.
“The way he worked was from another era,” she says. “Every worker in the workshop would have one piece to make from scratch with just a very small idea from the designer. And then you would make all the preview pieces to make sure it was more or less what he wanted and how you wanted it. And then you would make the piece until it was finished. So you could really say, ‘That’s my piece, and that’s high jewelry.’”
Dumas spent almost five years honing her skills and mastering every stage of the jewelry-making process. “The most important thing that it gave to me is the understanding that you need to have the idea, to know what you want to do, and then if you don’t have the technique, you’ll find it. This way, I learn every day…. I challenge myself, and I make new things and use techniques in different ways.”
Two-finger Hokusaï wave ring set with Ceylon sapphires, emeralds, and diamonds, in 18-karat Fairmined yellow gold and recycled blackened silver. (Maison Alix Dumas)Two-finger Hokusaï wave ring set with Ceylon sapphires, emeralds, and diamonds, in 18-karat Fairmined yellow gold and recycled blackened silver. (Maison Alix Dumas)
Today, her own atelier is in northwest France’s Brittany region, and she’s looking to expand her presence to the US and Asia. She hopes to open her workshop to more craftspeople so she can bring Maison Alix Dumas to its full potential.
“I really want to train people to come work with me and to give them all this knowledge that I have now,” she explains, noting that the big houses tend to have its workers specialize in one part of the process or another. “For a jeweler to have the knowledge of all the steps to make a piece and also have the creativity — that’s something that almost doesn’t exist anymore.”
Transmitting skills in this way, as her boss once did for her, is important to Dumas. “I know that today I’m not there yet, but that’s the goal I have.”
Leaves earrings set with tsavorite garnets and yellow sapphires, set in 18-karat recycled yellow gold and anodized titanium. (Maison Alix Dumas)Leaves earrings set with tsavorite garnets and yellow sapphires, set in 18-karat recycled yellow gold and anodized titanium. (Maison Alix Dumas)
Main image: Alix Dumas selecting the stones for the Magnolia brooch. (Maison Alix Dumas) "
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