Cafayate necklace | Cartier
Unveiled on the red carpet of the 2025 Venice Film Festival, the Cafayate necklace presents Cartier’s En Équilibre philosophy through color, cut and balance. Worn by Riley Keough, the jewel was executed in yellow and rose gold and required 1,460 hours of atelier work to complete.
Gemstones & composition
Centerpieces: a pair of opals weighing 5.64 ct and 4.59 ct. Both display a strong play-of-color with red, orange and yellow flashes that set the chromatic theme of the jewel.
Accent stones: 51 Umba sapphires from Tanzania’s Umba Valley, each fashioned in a bespoke half-moon cut. The palette ranges from lemon-yellow through honey and tangerine to soft pink, creating a graduated halo around the opals and extending into the line of the necklace.
Metalwork: yellow and rose gold are interwoven to echo En Équilibre’s equilibrium between symmetry and asymmetry, warmth and light.
Cut, setting & structure
The half-moon cut—rare in high jewelry and custom-designed for this piece—allows the sapphires to read as ribbons of color rather than discrete stones. The flat edge of each half-moon sits in precise dialogue with neighboring gems, while the curved edge amplifies light return along the necklace’s contours.
The two oval cabochon opals are matched for body tone, pattern and spectral response, so their chromatic “conversation” remains constant under changing light.
Gold elements are engineered in alternating modules to balance visual weight on both sides of the central duo, achieving Cartier’s hallmark poise without rigid bilateral symmetry.
Craftsmanship
Over 1,460 hours were devoted to stone selection, custom cutting, calibration, matching and assembly.
Each sapphire was chosen for hue, saturation and transparency, then recut where necessary to achieve a smooth chromatic gradient and millimetric alignment with the opals’ curves.
The gold framework integrates micro-tolerances so the necklace lies fluidly at the clavicle while retaining structural integrity around the heavier centerstones.
A note for gem lovers
Opals (5.64 ct and 4.59 ct): prized for their warm spectral play-of-color, calibrated as a pair for pattern and brightness.
Umba sapphires (51 stones): a historic East African sapphire suite notable for yellow-to-pink hues uncommon in traditional blue corundum; the half-moon profiles enhance directionality of light and create seamless chromatic bands along the necklace.
Gold: the duet of yellow and rose alloys heightens the perceived temperature of the palette, framing the opals’ fire and reinforcing the design’s equilibrium.
The Cafayate distills Cartier’s En Équilibre concept into a single, confident gesture: two luminous opals in conversation, held in perfect balance by a sculpted current of half-moon Umba sapphires and warm gold.
Photography courtesy of Cartier; Stéphane Cardinale / Corbis / Getty Images; Mondadori Portfolio / Getty Images.
— Gem Exploring Editorial
