Founder of ‘La Môme Bijou’ Isabelle Prat invests in the beau­ti­fi­ca­tion of the world through jew­el­ry. For over twen­ty years, she worked as a mod­el mak­er for pre­mier fash­ion hous­es on Avenue Mon­taigne. In 2006, she found­ed her very own lux­u­ry jew­el­ry brand, with a quirky and good humored spir­it. She is a pas­sion­ate craftswoman who enjoys liv­ing in a bub­ble of cre­ativ­i­ty.

What’s the story behind La Môme Bijou’s name and identity?

Isabelle Prat: I was giv­en a beau­ti­ful book, by pho­tog­ra­ph­er Bras­saï. In it, there was a pho­to of ‘La Môme Bijou’, a woman who lived in the 1930s. She was an old sex work­er, who wore lots of pearls. Her name was Bijou. She was a char­ac­ter real­ly, from Mont­martre. As my stu­dio over­looks the dis­trict, it just made sense. I found that it sound­ed very - very — Parisian. I liked the name, and it had the word ‘môme’ in it (which means ‘kid’ in French). Since I nev­er real­ly grew up, it suit­ed me com­plete­ly. In the uni­verse, there is child­hood, col­or, and joy. There are lots of lit­tle details that con­nect.

What’s your favourite jewelry piece you’ve created?

Isabelle Prat: That would be my first col­lec­tion: In My Bub­ble. I thought it was fun to have made a col­lec­tion with two total­ly dif­fer­ent parts, both incor­po­rat­ing bub­bles — either com­ic bub­bles or soap bub­bles. I find it quite amus­ing.

The first part uses ono­matopoe­ic com­ic bub­bles as jew­el­ry. I find it quite play­ful with its mes­sages. What is pleas­ant and fun­ny is that the ono­matopoeias are placed in mean­ing­ful places. For exam­ple, the bub­ble worn around your neck says: ‘Blah Blah Blah.’ It’s very Licht­en­stein — a jew­el­ry ver­sion. And the com­ic bub­bles are indeed com­plete­ly inspired by pop artist Licht­en­stein.

The sec­ond part is soap bub­ble jew­el­ry. I loved play­ing with soap bub­bles when I was lit­tle, blow­ing soap bub­bles with dish­wash­er liq­uid and a small tube. The beads I used have this ‘soap bub­ble’ effect.

How did you learn to express yourself through metal?

Isabelle Prat: I learned at school, 40 years ago now. We pro­duced jew­els. We start­ed with wire and real­ly learned the basics. After that, I learned from a jew­el­er, who real­ly taught me all the tech­niques, from mak­ing an alloy of gold — ‘melt it’, ‘lay it flat’, ‘shape the met­al plane’ — to cre­at­ing pieces for artists or par­tic­u­lar clients. It was very enrich­ing.

What is the most unconventional material you have worked with?

Isabelle Prat: The feath­ers that I found in the Moulin Rouge work­shops! I made a fair­ly visu­al and strong col­lec­tion called ‘Bird of Par­adise’. I found these beau­ti­ful burnt ostrich feath­ers in a work­shop in Mont­martre. They are from the ostrich’s moult, not plucked from them. The feath­ers were col­lect­ed, assem­bled and died in a wide array of colours by the work­shop. I used my favorite range of rain­bow shades for the jew­els, and also I cre­at­ed a fair­ly inter­est­ing mon­tage mar­ry­ing feath­ers and cor­dons. It made for quite visu­al pieces, while stay­ing very light.

Describe your perfect creative day.

Isabelle Prat: Where would I go? A very sun­ny place. Dur­ing the hol­i­days. I’d have an idea, while on a vis­it to a muse­um or on the beach, when some­one who inspires me pass­es by, per­haps because they are wear­ing some­thing par­tic­u­lar that I would nev­er have seen oth­er­wise.

Often­times, we give up on cre­at­ing because we’re caught up with life and don’t real­ly have time to think or open up our imag­i­na­tion. It is rather in escap­ing else­where that I find inspi­ra­tion. When I’m on the move, the ideas come.

What does the ‘super-vitamin world’ you dream of look like?

Isabelle Prat: Being dressed in col­or, or even just hav­ing a col­or­ful acces­so­ry, helps you start the day with a smile — a lit­tle more ener­gy than dress­ing in gray, black or brown. I am quite par­tial to colour all year round, but even more so when the weath­er is gloomy. In win­ter and autumn, I don’t under­stand why peo­ple dress in black. Colour is impor­tant when the weath­er is gray, as it often is in cities, be it Paris or else­where.

How do you see the intersection of technology and jewelry design evolving in the next decade?

Isabelle Prat: Today, a lot of jew­el­ry is made with com­put­er-aid­ed design. It’s done by soft­ware, and print­ed in 3D. I call on peo­ple who have mas­tered this knowl­edge to cre­ate cer­tain col­lec­tions, but I am more on the arti­sanal side. I real­ly like to do things by hand. I am not too into tech­nol­o­gy, espe­cial­ly since I decid­ed to start mak­ing jew­el­ry with ‘grand feu’ enam­el, an ances­tral tech­nique. I think it’s good to also keep the old meth­ods for mak­ing jew­el­ry.

La Môme Bijou’: Humans as beacons of colour.

‘La Môme Bijou’ is a play­ground, beck­on­ing to those with youth­ful hearts. The brand imag­ines a super­charged world of bright and stim­u­lat­ing peo­ple. It is jew­el­ry that dares to be friv­o­lous and irrev­er­ent, reclaim­ing the light­heart­ed spir­it of child­hood. The wear­er trans­forms into a bea­con of colour, spread­ing joy and whim­sy all around them through beads and bub­bles, invit­ing oth­ers to embrace the lux­u­ry of play.

Want to get to know more sur­pris­ing­ly won­der­ful and sus­tain­able cre­ators? Check out L’A­vant-Garde.