For Choisne, that tension between innovation and familiarity is the bedrock of the true value of high jewelry: the emotional jolt at first sight that can lead to a purchase. A freeform ride across time, myth and pop culture underpinned “Into the Horsescape,” the 90-piece high jewelry collection imagined by Pierre Hardy for Hermès. After seeing his jewels mixing tortoiseshell acetate with gold and diamonds, “[Clients] keep telling me, ‘Oh, it’s very you’ which is for me very important.” In that price range, unique designs find themselves in competition with repeatable high jewelry and even the upper reaches of branded fine jewelry. For French jewelry brand Viltier, which recently stepped into high jewelry, the July date was its first formal outing.