Inside the Van Cleef & Arpels Savoir-Faire School
Being open to the public is one thing, training students in a school is another. It’s been one year now since Van Cleef & Arpels embarked on this adventure – and the endeavour has exceeded all its expectations.
By Olivier Müller
"Grown-ups have responsibilities”, as parents are constantly telling their children. This is just as true for grown-up companies. As they gain critical mass and market influence, businesses should also be gaining an awareness of their ensuing responsibilities. One such duty is that of educating the public. Van Cleef & Arpels has taken its responsibilities in this respect fully to heart. The vocation of the Van Cleef & Arpels School founded by the firm – the only institution of its kind in the world – is to instruct the general public in the arts of watchmaking and jewellery.
Set up in February 2012, the School is open to all. The syllabus comprises 13 classes, delivered by 23 teachers. And make no mistake: the ethos here is not one of attendees listening to lecturers, but of students attending classes given by a teacher.
Teachers are recruited according to criteria of “undisputed expertise, passion and the ability to teach,” explains Marie Vallanet-Delhom, the School’s Director. In other words, the faculty are top-level experts, even if they do not all hold degrees from a state-run teacher-training college.
Learning and experimenting yourself
Indeed, the skills of the experts in question more than make up for any lack of formal teaching qualifications. For example, the man behind the “history of time and of mankind” class is Dominique Fléchon, author of “La Conquête du temps” – the definitive history of time measurement. Fléchon gives four hours of classes covering everything from the Big Bang to the twenty-first century. Students are unlikely to be caught gazing out of the window in a daydream: classes consist of groups of no more than twelve, with at least two teachers.
This size limit has a twofold objective: “making the classes as interactive as possible, and being able to give the students the opportunity to touch, feel, assemble and dismantle the materials themselves,” explains Marie Vallanet-Delhom. In a nutshell, the School blends theory and practicals: the study of jewellery includes a class on cutting and setting; the students try their hand at these two arts using the equipment and stones provided. In watchmaking, they will have to put in time at the workbench, dismantling and reassembling their own movements.
In a nutshell, the School blends theory and practicals: the study of jewellery includes a class on cutting and setting; the students try their hand at these two arts using the equipment and stones provided. In watchmaking, they will have to put in time at the workbench, dismantling and reassembling their own movements.
An invaluable first stage in the educational process
The institution founded by Van Cleef & Arpels is remarkable for its ambition and its rigorous management approach. Based for the time being in Paris, where the parent company is headquartered, it has already been temporarily exported to Japan. Some 1500 students of 23 different nationalities have taken the course, which has been accredited by the French state.
As to the next steps, Van Cleef & Arpels makes no secret of the fact that while the School has an educational vocation, it is intended to turn a profit, too. With course fees averaging CHF 750, the School, supported by the Richemont Group, is managed as an independent branch of the jewellers – and intends to expand in much the same way. Remote learning is one development being looked at, and a second satellite centre outside France could well be opening in the near future, too.
