Winged Icons: Exactly 60 years ago, a rare little bird was born at Tiffany's

Jewellery doesn’t often get away with being cheeky. It’s supposed to be serious— diamonds, platinum, carats, provenance. Yet in 1965, Jean Schlumberger, Tiffany & Co.’s wildest design mind, stuck a diamond-eyed cockatoo on top of a gemstone and called it Bird on a Rock. What could have been a novelty joke became an icon: optimistic, joyful, a little absurd—and instantly desirable.

Almost 60 years later, Tiffany is giving the bird its biggest stage yet. The House has reimagined the motif into an expansive high and fine jewellery collection: Bird on a Rock by Tiffany. Under the creative eye of Nathalie Verdeille, Chief Artistic Officer of Jewellery and High Jewellery, the collection feels both reverent and rebellious.

The bird, two ways 

In one direction, the designs lean into naturalism: birds rendered in sculptural detail, their wings mid-flutter, perched on gems like tanzanites (a Tiffany legacy stone since 1968) or strands of hand-selected turquoise. Schlumberger was obsessed with capturing life in motion—and these high jewellery pieces carry that same restless energy.

In the other, Verdeille distills the bird down to its essence: the wing. Abstracted, stylised, and sculpted in diamonds, gold, and platinum, the Wings fine jewellery line is Tiffany stripped back and modern. Stackable rings and fluid earrings evoke plumage without ever tipping into literalism—jewellery that flirts with symbolism but also looks seriously good in real life.

Colour, craft and contradiction

The two high jewellery suites are exercises in maximalist beauty. The tanzanite set pairs ­violet-blue gems with rubellite and aquamarine, while the turquoise suite riffs on Tiffany’s own history—turquoise was a Schlumberger favourite, and the colour famously inspired the brand’s robin’s egg Blue Box. Each bird gets ruby eyes, a Schlumberger signature, while the settings are technical flexes: flame-set diamonds, feather-like engraving, gold bellies lit with bright-cut stones.

It’s hard to miss the subtext: Tiffany isn’t just protecting its heritage, it’s flaunting its craftsmanship in the loudest, and most striking way possible. Each piece is handmade, no two birds are the same, and everything flirts with that thin line between the serious and the surreal.

There’s a reason Bird on a Rock has stuck around. It doesn’t just show Tiffany’s technical might, it shows the House’s willingness to be playful in an industry that often takes itself too seriously. 

Sometimes the most powerful jewel in the room is a bird, perched smugly on a rock, daring you not to smile.

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02  Bird on a Rock necklace, tanzanite, ruby and diamonds on platinum and yellow gold