Van Cleef & Arpels Vintage Alhambra 20 Motif Carnelian Yellow Gold Necklace

Twenty clovers, one red. This Van Cleef & Arpels Vintage Alhambra long necklace runs twenty carnelian motifs along an 18k yellow gold chain, each framed in the maison's beaded border.

This is the format Alhambra was born in. The 1968 original was a long sautoir, meant to be worn over a sweater or doubled at the collar, and the 20 motif is its direct descendant. Carnelian suits it better than almost any other stone. It's a chalcedony, slightly translucent, so the color changes with what's behind it. Against skin it glows orange. Against black it deepens toward brick red.

The hard part is the matching. Carnelian comes out of the ground in everything from pale apricot to near-brown, and VCA has to find twenty slices that sit together as one color. Laid flat, these read as a single warm red with only the faintest shift from motif to motif, which is what natural stone should look like.