Cufflinks are making a huge comeback. Lots of boys in Hong Kong are getting their shirts tailor-made with initials on the cuff nowadays, and catered for using cufflinks. This is not just for menswear. Look at the cute white shirts from Anne Fontaine! Most of them have buttonholes on both sides to accommodate for fancy and feminine cufflinks, which are especially popular among female financiers and lawyers. And that is why Ben gave up his career in landscape architecture and started Patinova, specializing in cufflinks made of demonetised Hong Kong coins, Qing dynasty commemorative coins, and Chinese calligraphy characters.
Patinova merges two Latin words together, with patina meaning changes through weathering, and nova standing for new. Ben aims to offer these fine historical pieces a well deserved new life by giving it a spin and turning it into something attractive yet practical. As a proud Hong Kong company, Patinova produces cufflinks that carry our little city’s history, making them a distinctively conversational piece. I have been fortunate enough to grab hold of Ben for a quick interview, who gave us some insider’s insights on converting from landscape architect to jewellery designer, as well as offering his personal tips on how we should pick and choose cufflinks!
Patinova merges two Latin words together, with patina meaning changes through weathering, and nova standing for new. Ben aims to offer these fine historical pieces a well deserved new life by giving it a spin and turning it into something attractive yet practical. As a proud Hong Kong company, Patinova produces cufflinks that carry our little city’s history, making them a distinctively conversational piece. I have been fortunate enough to grab hold of Ben for a quick interview, who gave us some insider’s insights on converting from landscape architect to jewellery designer, as well as offering his personal tips on how we should pick and choose cufflinks!
Why did you decided to fuse collector’s coins with cufflinks?
Coins are like a living part our history, since we would, hopefully, be encountering them a daily basis. As a coin collector, I have always been captivated by how our money reflects our past like an instant snapshot in time. Look at this pair of five cents featuring the bust of the late King George VI, Queen Elizabeth II’s father, a reluctant monarch well portrayed by Colin Firth in the King’s Speech! These coinages are great ways of communicating the fascinating Hong Kong story, and keeping them well is another excellent approach in preserving our collective memories, which doesn’t just consist of buildings and piers.
Jewellery has been made from currency for as long as we had currency, from our earliest denominations, seashells, which were used both for trading as well as for decorating. Picking out exclusive jewellery pieces have been an increasingly popular way to express our individuality. For me personally, I have been searching high and low for some coin cufflinks, but I just couldn’t find what I want. I even went off to a couple of local silversmiths to get some made, and have been told one time too many that it just could not be done. That is why I decided to challenge myself in making the impossible, though to make the project viable, I need to produce a certain quantity to meet the minimum manufacturing requirement, which is why I had to have a plan in selling the extra few off. That is how Patinova made its initial start. All of the manufacturing, though pricey, is done in Hong Kong, since it is easier to keep a closer eye over the process that way, and the quality control is reflected tremendously in our end products.
By turning rare collectable coins into trendy cufflinks, it feels like we have given these historical pieces a new chapter of its existence, conveying the history of Hong Kong’s colonial past from its beginnings with Queen Victoria all the way up to Queen Elizabeth II, each marking a different period in Hong Kong’s history. Some of the coins, with over a century behind them, are actually classified as antiques, so it would make an awesome Chinese New Year present paired with our iconic laisee packaging. Definitely a conversational piece over dinner at one of those hum-dee-dum relatives gathering!
Why did you decided to stop being a landscape architect and start being a jewellery designer?
With my background, though different as it may be in spatial design and jewellery design, the basics still apply, with the deliverables for both having to be functional while appealing. My prior training has made it much easier for me to put a finger on what I specifically wanted, especially with the aid of transferable skills like sketching and the command of Adobe Photoshop. I do enjoy being a self-employed jewellery designer over being a staff landscape architect, since the designs are more in my control, and I can express my creativity with fewer concerns regarding multiple stakeholders. Fewer boundaries I would say.
I can also see the fruits of my labour much quicker now, since landscape architectural projects are usually measured in years while jewellery assignments in months, so there is more job satisfaction now in going through a terrific journey discovering and exploring my Chinese heritage. I do hope that the Chinese side of my products will hit the right note with expats who appreciates the Chinese culture, repatriates who identifies with their Chinese background, locals who find collective memories with my pieces, as well as Mainland Chinese who is eager to learn more about our little city which is now part of the motherland.
Tell us more about your Qing Dynasty zodiac coin cufflinks and Chinese calligraphy characters cufflinks!
The Qing Dynasty zodiac animal coin cufflinks are reproduced from a set of talisman coins that dates back to the late Qing dynasty, which was generously given to me from a fellow coin enthusiast. They are great for blend something old with something new, so I fabricated the rabbit ones for 2011, and will be pushing through the entire line of zodiac animals out shortly, especially the dragon one, since the year of dragon is next in line.
The Chinese virtue characters cufflinks also started off as a personal project. I wanted to create unique gifts for my nephews, who had these Chinese characters in their names, which happens to form a classic phrase in Chinese, describes some well-desired virtues. That was how this series came into being, which is especially expressive since the different combinations of any two characters will create entirely different but equally auspicious meanings, making it a special way to describe yourself as well as a thoughtful gift for ones that you think well of.
How should we choose good cufflinks? How do we care for them, since it is so prone to lose just one of them?
Whether you are buying a pair for yourself or for others, you should always go for ones that are beautiful yet practical, which you know will be used and loved, since cufflinks should always be worn, and not just sitting there at the back of the drawers! There aren’t so much out of the way caring tips for cufflinks, since most of them would stay shiny as long as they are being worn. However, if they are being tucked away, they will start to oxidise, so the truth is it is less work in wearing them than protecting them for keepsake.
One of the annoying things about cufflinks is that you always tend to lose just one of the twins, and you have absolutely no idea what to do with the remaining one. The great thing about our Chinese virtue characters series is that since different character combinations have different meanings, so even if you do accidentally lose one, just get an entirely different character, and you will have new cufflinks instantly with a brand new meaning behind them.
Where is Patinova heading towards in 2012?
In the landscape architectural field, a design is considered successful for the more functions it can serve. Which is why in the coming year, more of my designs will be making small adaptation for it to be used as pendants, bracelets, and charms on top of its original cufflinks designs. There are two new Chinese-themed series down the pipeline, with special emphasis on dragons for the coming year of dragon in 2012. I am rather fond of the miniature dragon paperweight from the Republic of China period in Mainland China, so I shall be reproducing it as cufflinks, pendants, and charms with an antique finish. In a long term perspective, I am keen on take the concept of something old made anew, and spreading it to other cultures, transforming their everyday objects into chic and modern accessories, for its wearer to flaunt their superior taste and individuality.
Patinova
Website: http://www.patinova.com/
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/patinova
Email: info@patinova.com