THE MULTI – FUNCTIONAL TRANSFORMERS
“Transform and Play”
When Jewellery Designer Myriam Soseilos opens a case of her award-winning TRANFORMERS jewellery, the urge to reach out and touch it is overwhelming. At first glance, the pieces look like a bit like the original Meccano construction toys, all hinged links and screws, albeit made from rose gold and encrusted with black and white diamonds. And once you start playing with them, they act a bit like the retro building links too, opening and closing at their hinges to create a variety of shapes.
The In/Out Square Eternity Ring/Pendant may be a clunky name, but it seems less so when you discover that this one ring can be worn in 18 different ways, from a single ring, to a multi-finger ring, to a pendant.
But that’s where the similarity to construction toys ends. For this is no mass-produced piece destined for the hands of small boys playing engineers – it’s serious, highly sophisticated jewellery crafted by true artisans using precious materials.
As if to prove the point, Soseilos (whose jewellery sells under the brand name myriamSOS) has created a limited-edition Falcon piece which transforms from a ring to a pendant and back again, crafted from rose gold and studded with 650 stones in watery hues, including white diamonds, blue aquamarines and lavender amethysts.
Close its hinged wings to wrap around your finger as a ring, or spread them in flight to sit on a gold wire as a necklace. This is her current masterpiece, and it shows that the jeweller has other tricks up her sleeve in addition to her Transformers pieces, although it’s the playfulness of them that makes them so special.
My favourite piece from the collection is not the multi-use ring/ pendant/ stress-reliever, but the simple Rotating Ring, an open, rose gold square set with diamonds, with a triangular shaped tip that flips between a white diamond and a pink sapphire. It doesn’t have a million functions, but it does have a satisfying, muted ‘click’ when you twist it, making this a ring you won’t be able to stop playing with while it’s on your finger.