Jessica McCormack Fetes ‘CBK: Carolyn Bessette Kennedy: A Life in Fashion’
LONDON — Carolyn Bessette Kennedy, a Manhattan minimalist, wasn’t a magpie, but her jewelry carried meaning and value.
On Tuesday evening, fine jewelry designer Jessica McCormack hosted an intimate crowd at her Mayfair store on Carlos Place to celebrate Sunita Kumar Nair’s book, “CBK: Carolyn Bessette Kennedy: A Life in Fashion,” chronicling the tall, svelte and blonde New Yorker.
More from WWD
Nair was in conversation with Rachel Garrahan, project curator at the Victoria and Albert Museum.
“Carolyn was so effortless, and had such grace and poise. I really admire that she had her own innate sense of style, the way she dressed was timeless — that’s why images of her feel so relevant and still modern after all this time,” said McCormack, an admirer of the publicist turned wife of John F. Kennedy Jr.
Images of Bessette Kennedy are prominently shared on the designer’s Instagram on Wednesdays with the hashtag weddingwednesdays.
When Kennedy Jr. was preparing to propose, he went against tradition of a big shining rock and instead took inspiration from his mother, Jackie Kennedy’s Schlumberger ring that she had nicknamed her “swimming ring” for its demure design.
The sapphire and diamond stones in Bessette Kennedy’s platinum eternity band were acquired by diamond merchant Maurice Tempelsman, Jackie Kennedy’s last partner until her death in 1994.
The stones are said to mirror Bessette Kennedy’s blue eyes.
“I love Carolyn’s ring, and I love the idea it was inspired by one of Jackie’s. Lots of women come to us for eternity bands — I think they often attract a bride that’s more paired back in the way she dresses, but still wants a diamond ring,” said McCormack.
Nair found that the private princess, as Bessette Kennedy was dubbed by Vanity Fair, only wore Jackie Kennedy’s Cartier watch and had a penchant for gold wedding bands.
“She wore her mother’s first one, back in college, which she joked about having to dip in holy water before she wore it (following her parents’ acrimonious divorce),” she writes in the book.
“Once married, she bought a Cartier wedding band, which she adapted to a toe ring. Let’s not forget her own wedding band, inspired by the rib of a rattlesnake and made by their dear friend Gogo Ferguson,” she adds.
Best of WWD
Solve the daily Crossword
