Taiwan Today

For jewelry brand Chullery, October 2014 was a time for celebration. That month, the company established a presence at Taipei 101, one of the world’s tallest buildings and Taiwan’s most recognizable landmark. The retail outlet is not just another shop front, however, but part of a new section opened on the skyscraper’s fifth floor featuring 10 brands from the local cultural and creative sector. By being included in the selection, Chullery, which was founded by Lin Fang-chu (林芳朱), or Clare Lin, has been placed alongside internationally established names such as Franz, the high-end Taiwanese porcelain maker.

“Having a presence at a major tourist attraction like Taipei 101 should really boost international awareness of Chullery,” says Kuo Chen-wo (郭鎮武), a section chief in the Department of Education, Exhibition and Information Services at the National Palace Museum (NPM). Kuo knows the Chullery brand well, having overseen the establishment of a partnership agreement between the museum, one of the largest treasure houses of Chinese antiques in the world, and the jewelry designer in 2008. That deal allows Lin to use images from the NPM’s collection in her creations, making her the only jewelry designer to gain such an agreement with the museum.

Lin has come a long way from her beginnings in the mid-1980s as a private collector of Chinese curios. Since her days as a history major at Tunghai University in central Taiwan, the founder of Chullery has been fascinated by antique accessories and other small items that were part of traditional Chinese culture, such as beads, buttons, hairpins and the nail guards worn by aristocratic women in times past. “These small items generally received little attention from other collectors. I just wanted to save them from oblivion,” she says. Lin also spent a considerable amount of time reading up on antiquities, visiting museums, and studying traditional Chinese knotting techniques, which would later feature prominently in some of her designs.

Over time, the artist developed a greater appreciation of the items as well as an interest in creating something out of her collections. “Those old things are so beautiful, but I always felt something was missing, that something more could be done with them,” Lin says. “Western-style jewelry is part of modern fashion, but that’s not true of Chinese-style jewelry. That further motivated me to take action.” Today, most of Lin’s jewelry designs are either based on pieces in the NPM’s collection or incorporate antique accessories.

“This artist has a distinctly keen eye for the relationships between various materials, so she can create surprisingly excellent designs,” writes Hsi Mu-ren (席慕蓉), a well-known writer and painter based in Taiwan, in the preface to Lin’s 1997 book Talking Ornaments—the Wearable Art of Lin Fang-chu.

Lin uses a wide range of precious and semi-precious stones in her work, including diamonds, jade and pearls. Several types of these materials have special cultural significance, such as white jade, which Lin calls “more Chinese” than any other stone. She also likes to use high-quality coral harvested from the deep waters off the shores of eastern Taiwan to add a local flavor to her work. Another gemstone favored by Chullery is tourmaline, or bixi, which is believed to enhance the wearer’s beauty and health. Lin says that the Qing dynasty’s (1644–1911) Empress Dowager Cixi (1835–1908) was said to have often placed a tourmaline gemstone under her pillow for that reason. Then there are diancui, metal ornaments featuring kingfisher feathers that were commonly seen on the hairpins worn by aristocrats in ancient times. Lin often uses the ornaments, which are bright blue in color from the feathers, to create brooches or pendants.

Lin established the Chullery brand—the name is a combination of part of her given name “Chu” and the word “jewellery”—in 1992. Since then, it has achieved considerable recognition in Taiwan and abroad. The artist’s first major career milestone occurred in 1998 when one of her jewelry pieces was sold by Sotheby’s at an auction in Hong Kong. Works by Lin were subsequently sold in the gift shop of the Asian Art Museum of San Francisco in 2000, at a China Guardian auction in Beijing in 2004, and at an international exhibition of designer jewelry at the Esplanade, a top building complex for performing arts and exhibitions in Singapore, in 2005. The artist creates limited-edition and open-edition designs under the name Chullery, but sells one-off pieces under her other brand, Lin Fang Chu, which she established in 2003.

The artworks gained further recognition in 2002, when Fredrick Chien (錢復), who was then president of the Republic of China’s Control Yuan, gave one of Lin’s creations to former US President Gerald Ford (1913–2006) during a visit to the United States. The gift was from Lin’s Aesthetic of Life series—home decor items offered under the Chullery brand.

Without a doubt, the partnership established with the NPM has been a major boost for Chullery, not least because the museum is known for its high standards when it comes to cooperative agreements. The deal took about a year to negotiate, and every item created under the program has to be sent to the NPM for review before it can be sold. The artist has produced more than 240 items inspired by various treasures collected by the institution. “We use details from an NPM antique in our design of a new item, which is then crafted with up-to-date techniques,” Lin says. “I like to put a twist on tradition and give my works a modern feel.”

The museum’s Kuo Chen-wo, who also teaches in the Department of Crafts and Design at National Taiwan University of Arts in New Taipei City, northern Taiwan, appreciates this spirit of merging the old and the new. “With jewelry included in its gift shop, the museum can offer a more complete selection of souvenirs to its visitors,” he says. “Lin does a very good job of creating new things based on old ones.”

The “old is new” concept Lin holds dear is exemplified by items such as Yi Zi Sun, a pendant that debuted in 2009. The name refers to three Chinese characters found on a seal used by the Qianlong Emperor (1711–1799) during the Qing dynasty, and which is now held by the NPM. Meaning “good for the descendants,” the three characters showed that the emperor approved of a painting and that the artwork qualified to be preserved so it could be passed down to future generations. Inspired by the seal, Lin used the impression of the stamp as the basis for the pendant design in which ultrafine diamonds form the three characters against a background composed of micro-beads of red coral.

The Yi Zi Sun design gained the attention of Tony Soo (蘇一仲), who heads the Taiwan presence of Japanese air conditioning brand Daikin. The businessman bought two pendants as gifts for his daughter and daughter-in-law. “The pendants are distinct from other gifts not because of their financial value, but because of their cultural significance,” Soo says of the items, which cost NT$180,000 (US$5,800) each. “And they can be passed on to future generations since they’re ‘good for the descendants.’”

British expatriate Moira Breen is also a huge fan of Lin’s work. “I like the traditional modern Chinese style. There’s some kind of fusion that makes her works so special,” she says. Breen recalls being amazed when she first saw Lin’s designs on display during a visit to the National Museum of History in Taipei City last year. The British woman says she had hardly ever bought or worn a bracelet previously, but she decided to do so after seeing those offered by Chullery. “The stones of the bracelets are so well matched in size and color. The brand has a very accurate eye for picking them out,” she says.

Looking ahead, Lin is confident that her works will continue to grow in popularity, although there is concern over the availability of the antiques and materials used in her creations. Diancui and nail guards are not as easy to find anymore, she says, and Hetian jade, a kind of high-quality jade mainly from western mainland China, is also in short supply. “They’re harder to come by today, and if you find them, they’re more costly than before,” she explains. That said, Lin has learned to adapt by, for example, producing replica nail guards for use in Chullery’s necklaces. “Most importantly, I have a great passion for reviving the old with new designs,” the artist says. “That’s how I got here and why I’ll keep moving forward.”

Write to Oscar Chung at mhchung@mofa.gov.tw