Ciao Gianmaria. Just while the Reggia di Venaria is celebrating with a big exhibition his works, Gianmaria Buccellati Has passed away. He was 86 and had been ill for some time but, although in poor health, had been able to keep interest in the Italian goldsmith world , so much so in recent years had also participated as guide role for the jewellery awards organized by VicenzaOro.
Buccellati was the last of a dynasty of goldsmiths. A story begun in early twentieth century, with his father Mario, who in 1919 opened his first boutique of fine jewelry in Milan. The jeweler had among his clients also Gabriele d’Annunzio, who described him as the “prince of goldsmiths’. Gianmaria, born in 1924, went on his father experience. Immediately after the war, after the stores in Milan, Rome and Florence, Mario Buccellati brought his jewels also to New York and Palm Beach. In 1956 the company passed to his heirs, who in 1971, have decided to split. Gianmaria had pushed foward opening boutiques in Place Vendôme in Paris, London, Moscow, Tokyo and other cities in Japan, Hong Kong, Beverly Hills, Sydney. The divorce between the brothers ended in 2011 with the merge of family’s brands, nearly the final act of the long history of Gianmaria Buccellati. Matilde de Bounvilles
