“Quatre Sand” features a seven-piece set of cuffs and bangles in 18-karat yellow gold with black sand (price upon request).
Paris—Boucheron has debuted a set of cuff bracelets made with 3D-printed sand in its new capsule collection titled “Quatre Sand.”
The seven-piece offering is the latest release from Boucheron, which has unveiled an “innovative” capsule collection annually since 2020 featuring unusual materials and unique crafting techniques.
The new capsule is a reinterpretation of the jeweler’s “Quatre” collection, featuring graphic lines and a maximalist aesthetic, it said.
Designed by Claire Choisne, the creative director for Boucheron, the pieces fuse style and innovation, with 18-karat yellow gold and black sand incorporated through a 3D printing technique.
Black sand was chosen because of the “radical contrast it creates against the warmth of yellow gold,” said Boucheron.
The capsule includes bracelets made fully in 18-karat yellow gold, as well as ones featuring black sand in a “Clou de Paris” pattern over 18-karat yellow gold (price upon request)
The technique was borrowed from the automotive and aeronautics industries, the brand said.
First, Boucheron used 3D modeling to set the “oversized” dimensions of the pieces and the precision edges that characterize its signature Quatre pattern named “Clou de Paris.”
Then, each black sand component was shaped using 3D printing and mounted onto the yellow gold structural bangle.
A polymer binder was precision-sprayed onto the sand in layers less than a millimeter thick to make the grains adhere to each other as if they were glued.
Boucheron compared the process to that of making a millefeuille puff pastry, a French pastry made of multiple, thin layers of puff pastry.
The process yields “a remarkably hardwearing material” that retains the texture of the sand, the brand said.
The inner surface of the pieces are polished, while the edges are brushed to highlight texture and light.
The sand is finished with a special coating to seal in its color.
Related stories will be right here …
This capsule isn’t the first time that Boucheron has used sand in its jewelry.
It can also be seen in the “Blue De Jodhpur” collection from 2015, embedded into a rock crystal necklace, and in the “Or Bleu” collection from 2024, where a necklace, cuff, and pair of earrings were sculpted from black sand without metal edges or encapsulation.
However, for Quantre Sand, Choisne was tasked with the challenge of applying the material in clean, graphic lines rather than rounded contours.
The cuff set was designed to be worn stacked together or separately.
It includes four brushed gold bangles, a black and yellow gold bracelet with a large version of the “Clou de Paris” pattern, and two other bracelets with the same materials and pattern in a smaller format.
A limited quantity of the Quantre Sand collection will be available for purchase at Boucheron’s Place Vendôme boutique in Paris.
