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The Poetry of Precision

For over 100 years, Swarovski, the brand synonymous with ingenuity, poetry and technology, has developed its supreme mastery of precision-cutting, to become the world’s leading producer of cut crystal, genuine gemstones and created stones.

Swarovski and the Art of Crystal
Every day, in the quiet Austrian village of Wattens, where the company was founded over a century ago, Swarovski produces perfect, precision-cut, scintillating crystals. Celebrated worldwide for their lustrous depth and brilliance and the precision, CRYSTALLIZED™ - Swarovski Elements – created for the fashion, jewellery, lighting and interiors industries, reach out from Wattens, around the world, bringing light, life and glamour to creative visions everywhere.
Powered by a dedication to perfection and continual innovation, Swarovski also designs and manufactures its own finished crystal products, jewellery, fashion and home décor objects are sold in over 1300 distinctive Swarovski stores and concessions around the globe. The Daniel Swarovski Collection of Couture jewellery and accessories, conceived in 1989, in homage to the company’s founder and his vision, has become the perfect expression of the creative dynamism that lies at the heart of the company.
Alongside its core crystal business, Swarovski operates four brands: Tyrolit, manufacturing grinding tools, Swareflex, making reflectors for road safety, Swarovski Optik, producing precision optical instruments and ENLIGHTENED™ – Swarovski Elements, Swarovski’s brand for genuine and created gemstones.

Crystal Pedigree
The company’s founder, Daniel Swarovski I, (1862-1956) was a scientist and visionary, an entrepreneur and a humanitarian. He had grown up in a small village in Bohemia, working with his father, hand-cutting crystal for the glass and fashion jewellery industry of Gablonz. Swarovski’s roots are embedded in the heart of late 19th century Mittel Europa, with its rich cultural heritage, like the Wiener Sezession. Fascinated by electricity, and determined to unleash the full potential of crystal, the material that he knew so well, Daniel Swarovski I invented the first mechanical method for cutting and polishing crystal jewellery stones. In 1895 he moved with his young family to Wattens, Austria, to keep his invention away from prying eyes, and also to harness the hydro-electric power for the factory. The new Swarovski crystal stones or chatons, known as “Pierres Tailles du Tyrol”, revolutionised the industry, providing new levels of brilliance, consistency and precision to the world of Fashion. Building strong connections with Paris, Swarovski was soon working closely with the great names of couture, including Chanel and Schiaparelli both frequent visitors to Wattens. So began a tradition of creative collaborations that continues today.

A Passion for Perfection
CRYSTALLIZED™ – Swarovski Elemnts, timelessly modern, has become an essential ingredient of fashion and style today, as a creative material in its own right. With its unique blend of artisanship, advanced technology and creative workshops, Swarovski is renowned for the originality and variety of its ever-improving range of shapes, forms, cuts, colours and coatings, always in tune with, or one step ahead of, current design trends and themes.
Maintaining its long 20th century tradition of creative collaborations with such names as Chanel, Schiaparelli, and Christian Dior – for whom Swarovski created a special crystal jewellery stone, the Aurora Borealis - the company works hand in hand with leading design talent around the world. Crystal is used by both established and up and coming names, from Yves Saint Laurent, Armani, Versace, Gucci, Prada, to cutting edge innovators like Alexander McQueen and Hussein Chalayan, and accessory heroes like Jimmy Choo.

Swarovski on Stage
Throughout Swarovski’s history, stars of stage, screen and cabaret, from Marlene Dietrich to Madonna, have turned to crystal, with its ability to catch and hold the spotlight, as a way of highlighting their individual star quality. Today Swarovski crystal takes centre stage in the world of celebrity style, adding drama to performances, strutting the stage and parading on the red carpets of the world. The Daniel Swarovski and Swarovski Collection has a strong presence at the Oscars, the Cannes Film Festival and the Toronto Film Festival, chosen by stars and their stylists as an expression of glamour and confident individuality.
Crystal, like Hollywood, is all about selling dreams, and in recent years, Swarovski has rekindled its close working relationship with the movie industry, to give crystal a new glittering role in costumes, jewels and sets. In 2001, Swarovski collaborated with Catherine Martin, the costume designer of “Moulin Rouge”, creating bejewelled costumes for Nicole Kidman’s character, Satine, known as the Sparkling Diamond. Swarovski crystal stones shared the screen with James Bond in several dramatic scenes in “Die Another Day” and “Casino Royale”, and played a leading part in the magnificent chandelier in the film version of “Phantom of the Opera”. The collaboration between Swarovski and Hollywood is gathering momentum; crystal featured in “Ocean’s 13”, “The golden age” and “Dreamgirls” scintillated with a crystal curtain and crystal smothered costumes for Jennifer Hudson and Beyoncé.
Swarovski’s directional design projects are aimed at stimulating crystal creativity. Crystal Palace has regenerated the chandelier and Runway Rocks highlights to art of catwalk jewellery. Swarovski’s involvement with fashion and show business, culminated in the star-studded charity event, Swarovski Fashion Rocks for the Prince’s Trust, a fusion of music and fashion.

Swarovski Creative Objects
Since the 1970s, when a craftsman playfully glued chandelier parts together to create a memorable crystal mouse, Swarovski has designed, manufactured and retailed its own collections of crystal jewellery, accessories, homewares and objects, continually evolving, and driven by the company’s ongoing quest for design and innovation. The world-famous classic Swarovski crystal figurines, known as Silver Crystal, have been brought right up to date with the new, young, fresh Lovlots collection, zany animal characters, full of fun and personality, the latest in a long line of endearing crystal creatures. Tapping into a universal passion for the joys of crystal, a thriving Crystal Society, with close to 400,000 members worldwide, has grown up around Swarovski’s ingenious figural collectors’ items, many of them eagerly-awaited limited editions. Now the choice of Swarovski crystal products has expanded to include exquisite gifts, personal and fashion accessories and functional and decorative accessories for the home, objects of desire brought to discerning customers through Swarovski’s international network of distinctive stores, in the major fashion capitals of the world. Maximizing Swarovski’s close links to fashion, the new generation of Swarovski crystal home décor objects are influenced by major trends, so that functional objects for the home are totally integrated in Swarovski’s design for living.
The inspired Daniel Swarovski Collection of jewellery, handbags, watches, accessories and homewares, launched in 1989 and masterminded in Paris by an in-house creative team, has become the Couture signature of the Swarovski brand.

The Light of Life
Filled with the pure energy of light, and inextricably linked to the luxury of the chandelier, Swarovski cut crystal has moved into the world of interiors, as the company produces crystals for use in lighting, furniture, bathrooms, interior architecture, for homes, hotels and public spaces. Mutually creative partnerships with leading names in design have resulted in extraordinary jewels for the home, the famous Edra flap sofa covered in crystal, Tord Boontje’s iconic Blossom chandelier, part of the Crystal Palace project, and the spa-like “Swarovski bathroom made by Kludi” designed in collaboration with German bathroom manufacturer, Kludi.
STRASS® SWAROSVKI® CRYSTAL is the name of Swarovski’s brand for contemporary lighting and chandelier elements, both traditional and modern, that now grace some of the world’s most historic and breathtaking chandeliers, including those in the Metropolitan Opera House and the Palace of Versailles. State of the art lighting solutions, including the celebrated twinkling Crystal StarLED, like a starry night-sky, downlights and recessed spotlights, or illuminated crystal panels, open up a world of versatility and freedom of artistic expression.

Swarovski Kristallwelten
In 1995 Swarovski commissioned the Austrian multi-media artist, Andre Heller, to create a fitting tribute to Swarovski’s art of crystal, celebrating the first hundred years of the company’s achievements. Swarovski Kristallwelten, built into the mountains in Wattens, near Swarovski’s headquarters, is a multi-sensory experience, giving visitors the chance to immerse themselves in the seductive brilliance and infinite depths of cut crystal. Watched by a giant, carved into the hillside, with sparkling crystal eyes, its mouth spouting a waterfall, Kristallwelten takes the visitor on a journey through the world of crystal, moving between fantasy and reality, through individual chambers, all featuring crystal-centric works of art by renowned artists. Extended in 2007, due to popular demand, Kristallwelten has attracted more than 8 million visitors and is one of Austria’s best loved tourist attractions.

Swarovski Today
Swarovski today is an international corporation, of over 22,000 employees, operating in over 120 countries. Still family-owned and run, with a dynamic team of 4th and 5th generation family members at the helm, Swarovski is as dedicated today as it has always been to perfection and precision, to continual innovation and ingenuity in both design and technology. With its own trend research department, unrivalled technical expertise and a dynamic team of designers and craftsmen, Swarovski is able to keep ahead of global fashions, interpreting new directions, themes and inspirations for crystal creativity, all the time respecting the timelessness of this intriguing, meditative material. Deeply imbued with the spirit of its founder, and his humanitarian instincts, Swarovski today is totally committed to its corporate and ecological responsibilities, ensuring the well-being of its employees, and preserving the natural world of the dramatic Alpine landscape, that has nurtured the company’s inspiration and drive for innovation for over 113 years.

Into the Future
Just as the company’s founder, Daniel Swarovski I, ceaselessly inventive, constantly aimed at improving what was already good, so Swarovski looks to the future, exploring the endless possibilities of crystal, investigating new markets, and inventing new applications, such as crystal for packaging and paper. Swimwear, lingerie and sportswear are now embracing Swarovski crystal, and electronics, or even cars are beginning to find ways of integrating crystal into their design and decoration. Swarovski crystal drives innovation and pushes boundaries, yet it is also very much a disseminator of luxury and design excellence, giving everyday objects a soul, bringing pleasure to the widest possible audience, creating a future for itself.