LOVE ACTUALIZED: Love comes in many forms but for the past 56 years, the one from Cartier was a solid oval band of metal with 12 screws that required a screwdriver — and a helping hand.
Now this iconic design has been recast as the Love Unlimited, a supple articulated ribbon that can be done with one hand.
At first glance, the bracelet’s gadroons appear to be a decorative feature of the gold surface. The Cartier team imagined and assembled 200 miniaturized components as well as an invisible clasp system operated by a screw, which is pending a patent.
Two or more pieces can be attached together thanks to this novel element, forming necklaces or even belts. In addition to the bracelet, a ring featuring the same gadroon design and screws has also been created.
Arnaud Carrez, Cartier’s chief marketing officer, deemed the Love Unlimited range “a full testimony to the know-how, the craftsmanship of the maison,” he told WWD.
Cartier Love Unlimited ring with two other Love versions.
Courtesy of Cartier
“For all our icons, we have this duty, this commitment to continuously nourish them, infuse creativity and it’s about reinventing your icon [while] at the same time being very true to what it is,” he added. The jeweler is not averse to making significant changes to its signatures, as evidenced by the cushion-shaped Trinity models released in 2024 to mark the line’s centennial.
While the jewelry house does not share figures on how many bracelets it has sold over the decades, he said the Love, “the iconic collection since 1969” has “been going through decades with a lot of success, being reinvented and also embracing, since the beginning, this idea of freedom of love sealed with a screwdriver.”
The original Love bracelet was designed by New York-based Italian-born Aldo Cipullo, following an experience of heartbreak that led him to imagine a tangible reminder of romantic, unbreakable attachment.
From the initial two thin C-shaped pieces with 12 screws — a nod to the bezel of the Cartier Santos watch — two serve to lock the oval-shaped bangle around the wearer’s wrist.
In its new incarnation, which continues to be unisex, the design celebrates “love in all its forms,” Carrez added.
For Pierre Rainero, the French jeweler’s director of image, style and heritage, “it’s very positive to think or to dream about a love that could be with no limits,” he told WWD. For Rainero, that kind of flexible thinking was part of the original design and the Cartier way.
“When we have an idea of a new design — and that’s what Love was — we retain that idea not only because it’s different, original and relevant but also because we think it’s a strong design [that] can allow variations in the future,” he told WWD.
Cartier Love Unlimited bracelet with two classic versions.
Courtesy of Cartier
Already in the 1970s, a number of variations were released, from different band sizes to versions set with diamonds and other gemstones. More recently, new types of screw mechanisms and hinges were also introduced.
Launching on Sep. 29 globally, the Love Unlimited bracelet will retail for $9,400 for yellow and rose gold, while the white gold version will be priced at $9,900. Rings will be $2,670 for yellow and rose gold and $2,860 for white.
Alongside the new designs, the brand is introducing a campaign starring a pair of lovers, watched over by the Cartier panther as they move between New York and Paris.
