Marie Lichtenberg: "Creative irreverence must be driven by exceptional craftsmanship."

The breaking point came as a life impulse, spontaneous and radical. At ELLE, where she had already been editing offbeat fashion stories on pirate costumes, for example, rather than runway shows, a growing frustration set in. Without warning, she left for India. A total upheaval. "I set everything on fire and had to rebuild from scratch. I needed to learn, to reconnect with myself, personally, emotionally, creatively. It was almost therapeutic." She had already explored entrepreneurship while working at ELLE, with dresses and embroidered silk shirts adorned with jewels. "All the buttons were gold, precious stones." Cautious attempts, a foot in creation without truly daring. Because jewelry, for her, was forbidden territory. "I was a complete novice at the time, and for me, you don't touch jewelry." Her mother collected antique jewels, a world she observed from afar. "For me, it was a completely inaccessible world." But for someone who moves on instinct, a closed door is nothing but an invitation.

"Having ideas is the bare minimum when you're trying to be a designer. Every piece is a collective project. You bring together craftsmanship and talent, and that's what makes each piece unique."

She first created a piece for her daughter, the first locket, made in India. Then came the first forty "Love You To the Moon and Back" necklaces, inspired by a forçat necklace her mother had given her when she was fourteen. "This necklace was created by enslaved people in Martinique at the end of slavery. Paradoxically, they wanted to keep a trace of the past. There's something magical about this piece that I can't explain." She posted these forty necklaces on Instagram. Forty pieces, forty sold in forty-eight hours. "I was getting messages on Instagram, I was delivering to clients between noon and two. I was driving around Paris. That's how it started." Success came flooding in, with all the intensity and chaos that entails. "I didn't even know how to make an invoice. I only chased success, and we had to act, produce, structure, very quickly." Each day became a complete apprenticeship. "There were three years where time completely disappeared because things moved so fast, without a business plan. We worked with fifteen people in twenty square meters for five years. I can't quite celebrate yet, but it's a brilliant first step," she says with a smile.

When production scaled up, Marie Lichtenberg sought new partners for certain technical pieces. She turned to Italy. "When you arrive on the jewelry market with the irreverence that is ours, education is necessary. The workshops work with the biggest names and don't need us. We got in thanks to our ideas." With her teams, she revives forgotten craftsmanship, "like enamel, which was no longer used in jewelry, only in high jewelry." What drives her are the encounters, working with the best in their field. "What I kept from India is that you bring together craftsmanship. It's very rare for an entire piece to come from the same workshop. These are assemblages of know-how, of different visions." The move upmarket happened gradually, from 9 carats to 14, then to 18 carats. "I learned by doing." Her pieces blend technical excellence and boldness, like a defiance of conventions. 

"Ignorance allows me to preserve that freshness to keep being outside those small realities."

International expansion and professional recognition followed naturally. Las Vegas Couture Show contacted her in the brand's first year. She refused. "I knew that if we opened to the American market, we needed to be ready." In 2022, she won the "Best in Debuting" prize for her subversive Blunt Box locket. The following year, in 2023, it was "Best in Innovative" for the Magic 8 Ball, created in collaboration with Mattel. "It's ignorance that brought me the most, doing things with as much ignorance, will, and curiosity as possible." The same spontaneity as when she created her brand, which is now its backbone. "It's everything that's possible to draw from memory or childhood, which you then twist. And above all, what you can de-dramatize. Being able to say it's not that serious." Celebrity recognition happened naturally, organically. Rihanna, Lisa (Blackpink), Gwyneth Paltrow, Bad Bunny, Jay Z, Lewis Hamilton: the celebrities wearing her pieces multiply without any particular marketing strategy. Marie Lichtenberg experiences this recognition with the same spontaneity that has always guided her. What drives her: instinct, perseverance, and no small amount of love.

Reuben Attia