Cartier (1847-present)
Cartier is a French luxury brand that designs and supplies extremely high-quality jewellery, objects, leather goods, and watches. Initially founded by Louis-François Cartier (1819–1904) in Paris in 1847, the company remained under family control until 1964. Cartiers headquartered in Paris are now a wholly owned subsidiary of the Swiss Richemont Group, which also own companies such as Jaeger-LeCoultre, Chloe and Dunhill. Cartier operates more than 200 stores in 125 countries, with three Historical Maisons in London, New York, and Paris. Cartier has a long history of sales to royalty. King Edward VII referred to Cartier as “the jeweller of kings and the king of jewellers.”For his coronation in 1902, Edward VII ordered 27 tiaras and issued a royal warrant to Cartier in 1904. Similar warrants soon followed from the courts of Spain, Portugal, Serbia, Russia and the House of Orléans.
Cartier Suede Notebook sold by Jacksons antique
Cartier History
Louis-François Cartier founded Cartier in Paris in 1847 following a takeover from his master, Adolphe Picard. Almost 30 years later, in 1874, Alfred Cartier, the son of Louis-François’ took over the company, but it was not until Alfred’s three sons, Louis, Pierre, and Jacques, took over that the worldwide Cartier brand was established. Pierre Cartier Louis ran the Paris branch of Cartier. He was responsible for many of the company’s celebrated designs, including mystery clocks, watches and jewellery, including the famous Tutti Frutti jewels. The Paris branch moved into the Rue de la Paix in 1899.
In 1904, the Brazilian pioneer aviator Alberto Santos-Dumont was said to have been complaining to his friend Louis Cartier (son of Alfred Cartier) about the unreliability and impracticality of using pocket watches while flying. Cartier went on to design a purpose built flat wristwatch with a distinctive square bezel that was favoured by Santos-Dumont and went on to be favoured by many other customers. Cartier named the watch “The Santos” after the Brazilian pioneer, and it was the first and last time the brand named a piece after the original wearer. Not long after The Santos was designed, Cartier signed a contract with Edmond Jaeger (later of Jaeger-LeCoultre), which allowed Jaeger to supply the movements for Cartier watches exclusively.
Among the Cartier team was Charles Jacqueau known as ‘the Picasso of Jewellery design’ who joined Louis Cartier in 1909 and saw out his career with the business. The company also employed Belgian-born French jeweller Jeanne Toussaint from 1913, who became Director of Fine Jewellery in 1933; Toussaint was responsible for a huge influence on the overall jewellery design at Cartier, supplying jewellery to the Duchess of Windsor.
Pierre Cartier established a New York City branch in 1909 and moved to 653 Fifth Avenue in the Neo-Renaissance mansion of Morton Freeman Plant, designed by architect C.P.H. Gilbert in 1917. Cartier purchased it from the Plant family in exchange for $100 in cash and a double-stranded natural pearl necklace valued at the time at $1 million. Cartier had branches in London, England, New York, USA and Saint Petersburg, Russia by this time.
Following the success of the Santos watch, Louis Cartier went on to design a watch named ‘The Tank’, which was introduced in 1919. Louis was said to have been inspired by the newly introduced tanks on used on the Western Front in World War I. In the early 1920s, Cartier went on to form a joint-stock company with Edward Jaeger to produce movements solely for Cartier. Cartier also continued to use movements from other makers such as Vacheron Constantin, Audemars Piguet and Movado. During this period, Cartier also began adding its own reference numbers to its watches by stamping a four-digit code on the underside of a lug. Jacques took charge of London operations and eventually moved to the current address on New Bond Street.