Feature
The warrior queen Boadicea was a woman not to be trifled with. Ruling the ancient Celtic Iceni tribe with her husband Prasutagus from what is now Norfolk, parts of Suffolk and Cambridgeshire during the 1st century AD, she led a revolt against the Roman occupation of Britain following the death of her husband and mistreatment of her subjects. In his will, Prasutagus left his kingdom to their two daughters but instead the Romans seized his assets, had Boudica flogged, and their two daughters raped; unleashing a fury in her that lead to a yearlong war in the East of England, with 80,000 casualties.
And she did it all wearing a golden torque or torc – a rigid neck ring worn by the Celtic tribes symbolising rank, power and beauty. Boadicea was a statuesque woman with wild, flowing red hair and when she rode her chariot into her last battle, her daughters were beside her. Outmanoeuvred by the Roman army, she was eventually defeated but many years later during the English Renaissance from the 15th-17th centuries and during Queen Victoria’s reign, her bravery and fight for independence were celebrated and she was declared a heroine. In the process, she catapulted the torque into jewellery history where it has reverberated around the necks of powerful women ever since.
“For me, jewellery is a tool of transformation, of empowerment,” says Dina Komal, designer of the MM Torc and the Tribal Disc Torc in her signature beige gold and diamonds. “It is 100% warrior, and the state of mind that gives you power.” She created her first torque in 2015 when one of her collectors wanted something bigger with an edge and she became obsessed with them, gaining a cult following for her designs. “I like the fact in history, you couldn’t take it off,” she muses. “It feels like body scaffolding and changes your posture.
I want the torques I create to hit a nerve physically and mentally.” The ideology behind the torque centres around strength, with many ancient cultures wearing them including the Scythians of Eastern Iran, the Illyrians in the Balkans and the Persians during the Achaemenid dynasty who had a soft spot for stylised animal heads at the tips during the 8th – 3rd centuries BC. Texture was often a key feature among the Kalabari of Nigeria who wore bronze torques during funerals rituals and the Maasai in Kenya whose stack of neck rings show social and marital status.
In the Blast collection at Repossi, the Maasai have inspired a diamond studded collar to accompany their more traditional drop diamond torques which open at the front for women who may be fighting their own modern-day battles. In Glenn Spiro’s Materials of the Old World Collection, amber beads and antique Baoulé are suspended from solid hammered gold in totemic formation in a revival of torque art.
Torques are having a moment and The Calypso Torque in yellow gold with swaying blue topaz pendant is no exception, recalling Calypso from Homer’s Odyssey as she falls for a shipwrecked Odysseus, bringing Greek mythology into the mix within Cassandra Goad’s new Compass collection. Grima have also been suspending great chunks of colour in the form of amethyst and aquamarine from their classical torque necklaces since the 1970’s.
At Misho, sapphires and rubies pop from odd angles of an open-backed torque and at Tasaki, their torques get a refresh with the looping Chants Luxe Diamond Necklace where a single pearl sits regally on the collar bone. This is a romantic departure from their more minimal Balance Parallel necklace and worlds away from the Danger Gulper, a torque of magnificent proportions with pearl studded shark’s teeth and a piece that Boadicea would have surely worn had she been around today.
At Dior, Victoire de Castellane takes the braided gold motif inspired by chairs from the era of Napeleon III and encircles the throat dramatically with her torque-esque My Dior choker and at Thelma West, the Sade’s Embrace Torque with its slender pipes inspired by Nigerian sugarcane tethered by golden wire is tipped with marquise-cut diamonds in honour of musical royalty. Whichever way you wear your torque and whatever material you choose to lavish upon it; the sculptural intensity goes beyond simple link and chain.
Brazilian designer Fernando Jorge is experimenting with wood in earthy browns for his Deep Stream torque as an ode to the Amazon River, translating nature to the body. Back in 2019 he began using fossilized wood, horn and tagua seeds – recalling that early adornments were made of elements like claws and teeth. Movement is the key “There is sensuality, even if the piece is hard. A torque is more structural from the beginning and sits completely differently but it still has beauty and a purpose,” he says.
His creation in wood brings the torque back to its tribal roots and his research led him to the Kalabubu from Indonesia who wore torques of coconut shell slices held together with brass wire into battle for protection. The gallerist Nina Yashar wears his wooden torque with a jaunty Prada hat and Grace Jones is on his list of wild women he would like to adorn. He describes wood as part of the ‘circle of sophistication’ where collectors on their jewellery journey wear it having fulfilled their earlier needs for more classic materials.
The Ocean silver torque twisted and spiralling downwards by Ute Decker provides a more minimalist alternative to the warmer shades of wood, bronze and gold. As does the Blade, a razor flat hammered torque by Giovanni Raspini. Ana Khouri seduces in a rock crystal iteration from her RAW collection with a white diamond perched at its centre and Jacqueline Rabun pays colossal tribute to queenly accessory in Metanoia with rutilated quartz, also in flashing silver.
In Artemis, named after the Greek goddess of the moon and using recycled silver with gold elements, Joy BC speaks of kinetic carved portraiture. Ultimately, the torque transforms a strong woman into something more. Claire Choisne at Boucheron has made a series of six ikebana in the tradition of Japanese flower arranging and in Composition no.2 combined a bejewelled branch of magnolia with a torque in black anodized aluminium.
A detachable stick insect looks quizzically on, delicately stepping from torque to flower. “I wanted this composition to be alive,” she says. Life and beauty have inextricably channelled through the torque throughout jewellery history, evolving with each designer’s touch. Before going into battle, Boudica reportedly called upon the Icenic war goddess Andraste woman to woman calling for victory and liberty and her torque held that energy until the very end.
Image Boucheron
Written by Melanie Grant for Tatler in October 2025.
