By Alex Y. Vergara
A beloved daughter turns only 18 once. To mark that special day a few years ago, art historian Renilde Vervoot decided to give her daughter a “special necklace” inspired by a piece of jewelry that dates back to the Roman empire. This time, though, the then Dubai-based Belgian academic, collaborating with a local jewelry manufacturer, updated the piece not only to make her gift look more current, but also to keep it from looking like it was taken straight out of a museum.
“Two weeks later, when I finally got the piece, I was blown away,” she recalls, showing a picture of her then 18-year-old daughter wearing her mother’s creation. “It was stunning. But the best part, of course, was my daughter loves it!”
Apart from the typical heart-warming story of the lengths a mother would go to to make her daughter’s milestone birthday extra special, Renilde’s accomplishment became all the more amazing because prior to that, she hadn’t designed a single piece of jewelry, not even a trinket, in her life. With this development, a jewelry designer was born.
With the encouragement of her manufacturer friend who egged Renilde on to design more pieces, the art historian decided to take her new-found passion to the next level by enrolling at the International Gemological Institute. Armed with fundamental knowledge, particularly on gemstones, Renilde didn’t lose time in practicing her second profession by flying to India soon after finishing the course.
So passionate was Renilde that “I kept on designing even without having my designs manufactured,” she shares. Since “I approached design from a different angle” then, she was in need of certain gemstones that weren’t available in Dubai, but only in Jaipur. Normally, most jewelry designers work around available materials they have. In Renilde’s case, it was different, at least initially. She would draw her designs first before sourcing the materials.
“After leaving Jaipur, I was $3,000 lighter. But I now had the gemstones to start my designs, and with that was born Sassi, which means gemstones in Italian,” she says of her jewelry brand.
Exclusively carried in the Philippines by Jul B. Dizon, which has stores at the Peninsula Manila and Shangri-La Makati, the Sassi brand is composed of several collections made of handcrafted 18-karat gold and the finest gemstones Renilde, the brand’s founder and creative director, herself designed: Nika; The Secret of Berenice, Iaera, Zeste, Tesserae and Enchanted.
Renilde, who’s very fond of the Philippines, decided to make the country her springboard, as she tries to expand by tapping into the lucrative Asian market. She’s also represented in the Middle East. After Asia, her next target is Europe. After all, the brand itself is steeped in Italian inspirations. Most of her pieces are done in the Middle East, but the materials are sourced from various parts of the world.
“I wanted to start here and see if there’s a market somewhere else in Asia. It could be Singapore, Shanghai. Why start in the Philippines? Because I love this country. I’m based here right now,” she says.
Despite channeling different inspirations for each family of collections, Renilde’s “children” are bound by something in common. They each have a story to tell, which is inspired either by history or ancient folklore ranging from such places as Byzantium, Zabargad in the Red Sea, the depths of the Mediterranean during the time of Poseidon and the Roman Empire, among others.
Apart from gold, Renilde makes use of mother of pearl and such colorful gemstones as peridot, amethyst, topaz, citrines and garnets. The designer’s background as an art historian is very much seen in each collection, from the epic stories, including legends, she weaves into each of them to, of course, the ancient inspirations that permeates everything about the pieces—from, say, the shapes, styles, details and color combinations.
Asked if there’s always a conscious effort on her part to update or reimagine her jewelry pieces, many of which were inspired by actual precious items that date back before modern history, Renilde has this to say.
“Sassi, for sure, isn’t a museum shop,” she says. “I’m not here to make replicas of old pieces. My pieces may be rooted in the past, but they’re updated pieces that are very contemporary.”
Sassi is carried exclusively in the Philippines by Jul B. Dizon, which has stores at the Peninsula Manila and Shangri-La Makati
