To find out what glamour is, I went right to the source - Chopard's Caroline Gruosi-Scheufele. In the face of bling and excess, Chopard perennially designs and introduces watches that become trendsetters and fashion icons, while staying true to what they feel to be true glamour.
What is glamour? “Glamour, for me, is connected immediately with sparkle and diamonds, but I also connect it with a whole way of dressing and behaving, because you can be glamorous in jeans, you don't have to be dressed up,” Gruosi-Scheufele explains. “A person can be glamorous but that doesn't mean overdressed. High jewellery and diamond watches play an important part in being glamorous, too.
”Glamour is a state of mind, as well, because people can dress up and still not be glamorous,“she continues.”It's all in the way you do it, it's the style and the way people carry themselves. Today's world is very fast and hectic, very business orientated and very rough and sometimes scary even, so it's important for each one of us to try to see the world in a better light. That's why it feels good to dress up, get the best out of ourselves and enjoy a glamorous evening. A glamorous evening doesn't need to involve a hundred people in a ballroom; you can have a glamorous evening at home. I think it's good to distract your mind and take the time to see the beauty in life."
Chopard is universally respected for offering the best of glamour, year after year. “We succeed in making glamorous products, I think, because I am a woman designing the watches and the jewellery and it just comes natural to me,” Gruosi-Scheufele explains. “In other companies, it might be men designing the products and glamour has to do with proportion, style and a certain sensibility. It's not about just piling on the diamonds.”
Gruosi-Scheufele's favourite watch in Chopard's current collection is the new Ashoka diamond watch on a black strap with a full pavé micro-set dial - the diamonds are Ashoka cut, which is like emerald cut but which results in many more facets, so the watch shines much more.
“It's a beautiful, glamorous piece,” she says.


Source: Europa Star October-November 2006 Magazine Issue