SINGAPORE: Chopard co-president Caroline Scheufele is on a quest to persuade the luxury and banking industries to make the switch to sustainably mined gold.

While at a dinner party during the Basel watch fair earlier this year, Chopard co-president Caroline Scheufele was having a casual chat with Patek Philippe president Thierry Stern when the topic of Fairmined gold, her pet project, came up. Scheufele, who runs the business with her brother Karl-Friedrich Scheufele, recounts the exchange: “He asked me how the project was going, and I told him, ‘You can do it too! It’s not that it’s impossible.’ And he replied, ‘I need to discuss it.’ To which I said, ‘You don’t need to discuss too much, just get going!’ If we all make an effort, maybe we’ll make a statement as the Swiss watch industry.”

Fairmined gold has occupied Scheufele’s thoughts ever since Chopard launched its Journey to Sustainable Luxury campaign at the Cannes Film Festival in 2013. The campaign is a tie-up with the Alliance for Responsible Mining (ARM), a South African mining NGO, to provide social welfare, education and training for miners in South America, while protecting the environment around gold mines. Gold attained from such sources receive Fairmined certification.

As the first luxury watch and jewellery brand to embrace Fairmined gold, Chopard’s move was a bold commitment to sustainability and a strong proclamation to the industry and its consumers. “At Chopard, we’re proud to be the first to have done it, because a lot of people talk about it but nobody really attacks the problem,” says Scheufele matter-of-factly. “It’s good to be a trendsetter and leader, showing the way, rather than being somebody that follows.” Chatting with the spirited 53-year-old in Basel, one gets the impression that she does not mince her words.

“The hardest part was getting it started,” she says. “[But now,] everybody in the company is very conscious of it and proud to stand behind it. Switzerland is a very clean country, but we can all do more to give back to the planet.” From food to fashion, sustainability has been the watchword for some time now. But aspects of the luxury watch and jewellery industry, such as the sourcing of raw materials, remain behind the curve, something that Scheufele has been working hard to change.

A tenacious one-woman crusader — the Joan of Arc of sustainable luxury, if you will — she lobbies everyone she can. “Or at least I’m trying to. I’m not somebody who gives up easily.” After watch companies, financial institutions are her next line of attack — “They should be doing their part too!” — as most companies purchase their gold bullion from national banks. Admittedly, the take-up rate has been slow, which Scheufele attributes to several reasons.

“For us, being a family-owned company made it easier because we made the decision and said, ‘Let’s go for it.’ For our colleagues who belong to big groups, I think it’s more political, more complicated to push through. And people are often used to what they do, and are maybe lazy to change, go forward, roll up their sleeves and say, ‘Let’s do it.’” In this respect, Patek Philippe, being a similarly independent, family-owned enterprise, makes a good candidate. “That’s why I ‘attacked’ him!” she says with a laugh, referring to Stern.

Tedious process
According to Scheufele, cost is not a significant factor — the price of Fairmined gold is just 10% higher, and the excess is absorbed by Chopard — but the lengthy process required for a quarry to receive Fairmined certification can pose a deterrent. The laundry list of due diligence that must be carried out includes ensuring that no mercury is used in the extraction process; the working environment is secure; no child labour is involved; and the entire supply chain be transparent.

“It’s not as if you push a button and [the mine] gets certified; no, it’s a long process. The hardest part is always to start. But once you do it, other people get inspired and they follow. The ultimate luxury today is knowing how the product you’re using is produced. It’s an extra value, and shows that luxury can be sustainable. That’s the message we want to give.”

So powerful is this message that celebrities have been more than happy to propagate it. For example, when Australian actress Cate Blanchett was picking out earrings to don for the 71st Golden Globe Awards last year, she chose those from the Green Carpet collection without hesitation when told of its origins. French actresses Marion Cotillard and Virginie Ledoyen, too, made the conscious choice to deck themselves in Green Carpet pieces, and photographs of them doing so have made ample rounds.

Scheufele believes Fairmined gold products should be competitive with the brand’s other offerings, and that consumers should not be dissuaded by the higher price tag. “I’m not planning to stop absorbing the cost, because this is our contribution to sustainability. [10% is] reasonable, it’s not double the price,” she says. Scheufele remains optimistic that more companies will adopt Fairmined gold in due course, and when that happens, the price will come down. “The more people become conscious of it, the more they will ask for it, and more companies will start doing it. It’s like a snowball effect: It starts as a small ball and then becomes an avalanche as it goes down the valley.”

Meanwhile, she is happy to report that two more mines — one in Bolivia and another in Colombia — are in the process of being certified. This will give the brand more access to Fairmined gold for use across its various watch and high jewellery lines. Last year, the haul of Fairmined gold totalled 80kg, and was used on women’s jewellery pieces in the Green Carpet collection as well as on a men’s watch, the 25-piece edition L.U.C Tourbillon QF Fairmined.

This year, Chopard showcased the 250-piece L.U.C XPS Fairmined for men. For women, there is a special boutique line of jewellery: Palme Verte, inspired by the palm leaf motif of the Cannes Film Festival’s Palme d’Or award, which the brand manufactures. Available only at Chopard boutiques, the jewellery comes in a full suite: rings, earrings, pendants and bracelets. Scheufele says the collection targets “people who have a sensitivity to a green planet, people who love Cannes, people who love film, people who like to spoil their wives or girlfriends, and people who love Chopard, of course”.

For the love of film
Chopard has been the official partner of Cannes for almost two decades now. Reflecting on the partnership, Scheufele says: “We’re very happy to be involved with Cannes for 18 years. It’s like an ongoing love story. Cannes at the time when we started was a much more intimate festival than it is now, much less international. We grew with Cannes, and Cannes grew with us. It goes without saying that a woman dressed in an evening gown would need to have a bit of sparkle; so, a jewellery brand [sponsor] seems only natural. But, at the beginning, it was not a given. So we’ve come a long way.”

An avid film buff, Scheufele enjoys discovering films at Cannes that “nobody else has seen”. With her busy schedule, she rarely has time to watch films in the cinema, and only manages to catch up on new releases on board planes. So, the idea of a festival, where an international smorgasbord of films are presented in succession, appeals greatly to her. “You never get bored in Cannes; one year is never like another. There are always new celebrities, new artists and new countries [to discover].”

A favourite memory from Cannes was the time she met Elizabeth Taylor. Relating the encounter, she says: “Once, she came to our boutique to borrow a diamond necklace. The next day, her PA called to say that she had slept wearing the necklace and was interested in buying it, and what was the best price we could give her. She then bought the piece and invited me to the villa where she was staying and showed me all her jewellery.

“I laid out our jewellery on the coffee table for her to see, but she had a little Yorkshire terrier that was walking all over the table. I thought to myself, ‘I hope he doesn’t swallow an emerald or something!’ She eventually bought more pieces because she was such a big fan of jewellery. She was a great actress with a great personality.”

Following Taylor’s death in 2011, the necklace was auctioned off at a Christie’s sale in New York, and fetched US$230,500, far above the pre-sale estimate of US$30,000 to $50,000 — testament to the incredible aura surrounding the legendary actress.

Race relations
Chopard’s 27-year association with the iconic Mille Miglia race has spawned numerous commemorative watches, including this year’s tantalising trio, the Mille Miglia GTS

Flip the pages of any major style bible or gossip rag, and chances are there will be a fair few photos of A-list celebrities bedecked in a cascade of Chopard baubles. Thanks in part to its sponsorship of the Cannes Film Festival — now in its 18th year — Chopard’s image as a red carpet marque is so deeply entrenched in popular imagination that it can be difficult for the uninitiated to understand how its collection of motorsports-themed watches came to fire the passion of red-blooded males.

It all boils down to two things: Chopard co-president Karl-Friedrich Scheufele’s deep personal interest in motor racing; and the brand’s longstanding partnership with the motor racing world. The alliance was established in 1988, when Chopard threw its weight behind Mille Miglia, a 1,000-mile race from Brescia (a city in Lombardy, northern Italy) to Rome and back. That year, Chopard unveiled its first co-branded watch, the Mille Miglia Chronograph.

The rally is reserved for classic and vintage roadsters that took part in the original Mille Miglia competitions from 1927 to 1957 (the contest was reborn as a regularity race in 1977). Scheufele himself participates every year, opting for his favourite ride, a Porsche Spyder 550. In the navigator’s seat, one will usually find Scheufele’s old pal, Belgian racing legend Jacky Ickx, though occasionally Christine Scheufele tires of the bromance and takes over as her husband’s co-pilot.

Every few years or so, new versions of Mille Miglia watches are presented. This year, a brand new trio was introduced to the collection: the Mille Miglia GTS (Gran Turismo Sport). Not only did it come with cosmetic upgrades, but two of the models were fitted with in-house calibres, a first for the Mille Miglia line.

The collection comprises an Automatic, a Power Control and a Chronograph model. The threehander Automatic is powered by Calibre 01.01-C and the Power Control is driven by Calibre 01.08-C. Both are COSC-certified calibres derived from the workshops of Fleurier Ebauches SA, a movement manufacture that Chopard acquired in 2007. Both also feature automatic winding systems, a fact celebrated by the watches’ open casebacks. Meanwhile, the Chronograph model houses an ETA Valjoux 7750 engine, just like in previous editions of Mille Miglia chronos.

As with previous Mille Miglia watches, the aesthetic language spoken by the new trio is built upon a rich vocabulary of bold, masculine and sporty accents. Black dials feature high-contrast, oversized white numerals and markers, as well as red inflections that recall vintage dashboards. On the Power Control model, the power reserve indicator resembles a 1950s petrol gauge. On all three models, the date aperture appears in the race’s official logo, mimicking the numbers on the doors and bonnets of competing cars.

The Automatic and Power Control models come in 43mm cases; the Chronograph is housed in a 44mm chassis. They are forged from steel and paired with a steel bracelet or rubber strap, or in rose gold with a rubber strap. With their distinctive treads, the straps draw their inspiration from the Dunlop tyres of 1960s roadsters.

Aaron De Silva enjoys experiencing the world, and relishes writing about it afterwards.

This article appeared in the Options of Issue 691 (Aug 24) of The Edge Singapore.