Up close and personal with Chow Tai Fook’s creative director responsible for translating palace architecture into wearable art

When Nicolas Lieou was appointed creative director of Chow Tai Fook, he inherited nearly a century of Chinese jewellery tradition—and immediately set about dismantling it. Not destructively, but thoughtfully, surgically removing the ornate layers that have long defined Chinese high jewellery to reveal something entirely new underneath.

The result is a radical departure from expectation. Where traditional Chinese jewellery might feature elaborate dragons or phoenixes in pure gold, Lieou’s pieces draw inspiration from the same cultural touchstones—the studded gates of Beijing’s Palace Museum, the brick patterns of the Great Wall, the double happiness symbol—but translate them into sleek, minimalist forms that feel more Milan than Ming dynasty.

It’s a delicate balance: honouring 95 years of Chow Tai Fook’s heritage while creating jewellery that speaks to today’s global luxury consumer. For Lieou, the key lies not in abandoning Chinese culture, but in changing how we see it entirely.

See also: Culture meets craft: Chow Tai Fook’s Timeless Harmony high jewellery dazzles in Hangzhou

Palace Necklace (Photo: courtesy of Chow Tai Fook)

Your designs are a dialogue between eastern heritage and western minimalism. What inspires them?First and foremost, they’re about modernity … We are often inspired by our cultural heritage, but that heritage, especially in Chinese art and architecture, is quite heavy: [physically,] there’s a lot of ornamentation, and [metaphorically,] everything has a meaning. We really wanted to distil all these cultural meanings into pieces that are modern and that you can wear every day, but that can also be a part of you and your journey in life.

How do you translate intangible things like memory, identity and aspirations into the tangible language of gold and diamonds?That’s not just down to me; there are big teams behind making these pieces, and I really need to pay homage to them. That’s also the beauty of high jewellery, and Chinese culture—it’s not about individualism.

The team looks at design quite graphically … we zoom in on, for example, the gate [at The Palace Museum Beijing]: the studs on the door are in nine rows of nine. So we distil the cultural meanings behind this iconography into the pieces, and that creates the meaning behind the jewellery.

We wanted to make sure that when you see the pieces, and we let you know the inspiration, the connection is quite immediate. It’s not so esoteric, where you’re thinking to yourself, well, is this Great Wall? Is this the palace?

How do you achieve that balance, where the inspiration is visible but not too obvious? [It’s all in] how we set the diamonds. For example, for the collection’s Great Wall [piece], the sides of the diamonds are naked- edged; we didn’t overload them with metal and we really tried to stick to the ethos of the theme. The Great Wall is made of bricks, so that’s why, on the side of the diamond setting, we kept it clean, almost brick-like.

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Heaven & Earth Necklace from the latest collection launch (Photo: courtesy of Chow Tai Fook)

If you could reinvent one traditional motif for Chow Tai Fook’s global audience today, what would you pick and how would you reimagine it?We just launched the Joie collection which, I think, is a great example of this. We used a very traditional motif: double happiness. The moment I say double happiness, all you can think about is yellow gold—pure gold—bangles for a wedding. But when you look at the collection, it’s very modern and it’s not really about weddings.

We’re changing the way we are inspired by [and see] Chinese culture. The Joie collection is about happiness, but more about unlocking your happiness every day. This graphic [version] of the double happiness symbol is easier to wear, and it can stack with all your current jewellery and become one of your everyday pieces.

What do you see as one of the USPs of what you’re doing for Chow Tai Fook?When I met Sonia [Cheng, Chow Tai Fook’s vice-chairman] and proposed the direction for the high jewellery collection, we were quite in sync. It really is high jewellery for Chinese contemporary clients, and the pieces [require that we use] beautiful stones. They may not be the largest—but it’s not about the size of the stone. It’s about the sum of the parts, the craftsmanship, the design and the stones, all put together to make these beautiful pieces.

[It’s also about representing the region.] None of this was made in Paris, at Place Vendôme. I wanted to ensure that everything was made in China. We’re very proud of the fact that these are all our own workshops, and even all the custom cutting was done in-house.

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