Drawing, Design for Bangle Bracelet, for Gebrüder Hemmerle

In the late 1980s, Stefan Hemmerle created the first designs for the Harmony Bangle, a bracelet that has since become the signature of the Hemmerle firm. In the Harmony Bangle, the open-ended form, a style of bracelet that can be traced back to ancient times, is distinctly modern. Each end of the bracelet is capped in gems or stones while the rounded forms serve to extend the fluid lines of the bracelet. A hidden closure mechanism embedded within the bracelet enables the seamless form. The Harmony Bangle’s simple, sophisticated silhouette has become the basis of decades of imaginative and seductive contrasts of materials.
Hemmerle’s original conception of the Harmony Bangle featured exquisite gems set within the finest base materials. This concept drawing for a Harmony Bangle, executed by a member of the firm’s staff after a design by Hemmerle, illustrates a bracelet of gold set with jewels of exceptional quality—an emerald on one end and a sapphire on the other. The careful rendering emphasizes the rounded forms of the jewels by illustrating them both in profile and from above, and directs attention to the harmonious contrast of brilliant colors. A drawing of the bracelet at an angle emphasizes the circular fluidity that characterizes the Harmony Bangle.
This drawing is one of four Hemmerle drawings under consideration for acquisition. Together, the group would enhance the museum’s collection of jewelry design drawings.

Drawing, Design for Bangle Bracelet, for Gebrüder Hemmerle; Designed by Stefan Hemmerle (German, b. 1946); Germany; brush and gouache, watercolor and glazing on tracing paper; 30.7 x 22.2 cm (12 1/16 x 8 3/4 in.); Gift of Hemmerle; 2012-23-2