E Romantic Hotels: I and all the staff of E Romantic Hotels thank you for accepting this interview. You have a dream-like vision of the Middle Ages, which inspired your latest jewelry collection ("Bêtes Enchantées" Enchanted Beasts). Did that influence your choosing a house in Provins, a medieval town?

Stella Cadente: Yes, I was drawn to the contrast between the very 19th century style of the Maison, and the rest of the completely preserved town—you get the impression that you are going to see rogues running down the street. It’s an amazing town. The Middle Ages inspire me, I like the sophistication and the brutality of that epoch and I fell in love with this town at first sight.

E Romantic Hotels: Animals are important to you and they are very present at the Maison de Provins. In an interview you say: “I get the impression that the animals live in the rooms. That all you have to do is move your head and they’ll start talking to you.”

Stella Cadente: For me, whether it’s in my decorations or in my collections, there are animals, colors, and humanity, everything mixed up. It’s an entire universe. In fact, sometimes humans behave like animals and sometimes the animals are very human.

E Romantic Hotels: How did you choose the fairy tales that you illustrate in the universe of the Maison?

Stella Cadente: In a very instinctive and logical fashion: they are fairy tales that I know by heart. Alice in Wonderland is an extension of my 2003 collection. For the Snow Queen, I like the story of this woman who falls in love with a human and imprisons him in ice. Donkey Skin is a horrible story of incest, but its brutality is part of life. Fairy tales may be children’s stories, but they are not all sweetness and light. They are written to teach children about life, it all its brutality and its beauty.

E Romantic Hotels: For eight months, you photographed the most beautiful women of the world at the Moulin Rouge© for a book that you co-wrote with Florian Claudel and whose cover was designed by Jean-Luc Planche (Editions Albin Michel). Is that what made you want to design a Stella Cadente Moulin Rouge costume and recreate that universe of rich colors in a room?

Stella Cadente: It’s not the only reason. For a long time I’ve made jewelry for the Moulin Rouge. Beyond the book, which is a lovely souvenir, it’s a homage to a cabaret that has been a source of inspiration for me for a very long time.

E Romantic Hotels: Do you think it would be possible to illustrate this interview with your latest collection of jewelry, “Enchanted Beasts,” inspired by the Middle Ages?

Stella Cadente: Yes, definitely.

Photos © Stella&Claudel
Interview by Isabelle Brigout

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