The „Nau­ti­lus 1” ring ob­ject in the shape of a steam­boat is craf­ted in 85g 750 red and white gold and fea­tures co­rals, six moon­s­tone ca­bo­chons, four 8/8 dia­monds and ivory. The glass dome is made of glass bell, brass, cop­per and wood.

Ships are like a re­flec­tion of our li­ves. We em­bark on an un­cer­tain jour­ney, so­me­ti­mes in stormy seas, so­me­ti­mes in calm ones, in big steam­ers and small „nuts­hells”. We ex­pe­ri­ence ship­w­reck and ar­rive in di­stant ports. Ships sti­mu­late our imagination.

Li­ke­wise, the Nau­ti­lus steamer sym­bo­li­zes my jour­neys and dreams, unites the ex­pe­ri­en­ces of my youth and tre­a­su­res fan­ta­stic sto­ries. The ob­ject d’art reve­als the va­rious golds­mit­hing tech­ni­ques and aspects of my craft.

I was in­spi­red by my youth in Vitz­nau on Lake Lu­cerne, the vil­lage at the foot of Mount Rigi, where one can still sense a touch of the Belle Epo­que. Even Mark Twain de­scri­bed it in the nar­ra­tive about his Rigi as­cent at sun­rise. The steam­boat trips to Lu­cerne du­ring my app­ren­ti­ce­ship, with the poun­ding rhythm of the steam en­gi­nes, the smell of oil in my nose and the wind in my face, are me­mo­ries that have be­come part of my work. Li­ke­wise, I have al­ways been fa­sci­na­ted by the no­vel „Twenty Thou­sand Le­agues Un­der the Sea”, writ­ten in 1869 by the French wri­ter Ju­les Verne with Cap­tain Nemo as the main cha­rac­ter. In this book, Verne an­ti­ci­pa­tes the tech­ni­cal de­ve­lo­p­ment of the sub­ma­rine. The sub­ma­rine „Nau­ti­lus”, which is gui­ded th­rough the oce­ans by Cap­tain Nemo, tells a fan­ta­stic story of asto­nis­hing ac­tua­lity and the­ma­ti­zes our in­ter­ac­tion with the environment.

The laun­ched steam­boat ring is the first ob­ject of my plan­ned se­ries on this sub­ject. It is an ex­clu­si­vely hand-as­sem­bled uni­que piece with the en­gra­ving „Nau­ti­lus No. 1”.

Time capsule

My dear cu­s­to­mer and best­sel­ling aut­hor Gion Ma­thias Ca­velty in­spi­red and sup­ported me to rea­lize this pro­ject. The­r­e­fore, I am ho­no­red that Gion has agreed to con­tri­bute a short text on pa­py­rus. We sea­led this pa­py­rus tog­e­ther and en­c­lo­sed it in the steamer. What is writ­ten on the do­cu­ment will fo­re­ver re­main the se­cret of its wri­ter, un­less so­meone opens the time cap­sule one day. Thus, Gion Ca­velty has even top­ped his best­sel­ling no­vel „Fi­nally Non-Rea­der” (Ger­man „End­lich Nicht­le­ser”) by crea­ting a real „non-rea­der”: A sweet little se­cret that em­barks on a jour­ney into the unknown aboard the steamboat.