EPOULOGUE

Rome, in the years after the Second World War: the Eternal City is stirring again. Cafés glow into the evening, the grand palazzi reclaim their rhythm and a new generation is beginning to dream beyond austerity.  I nside the atelier of the Roman jeweller Bvlgari, another kind of transformation is taking place. The old rules of fine jewellery are being quietly challenged. The inspiration is unexpectedly industrial: the flexible, corrugated tubes used to protect and transport pressurised gas.  What might have belonged to an engineer’s workshop is about to become something infinitely more seductive — gold, transformed into movement. The ingenious Tubogas technique wraps long strips of metal around a core, interlocking them with extraordinary precision and without soldering. The result is supple, almost serpentine, capable of following the body with a fluidity that conventional rigid jewellery could rarely achieve.  Bvlgari officially introduced the Serpenti bracelet-watch in...