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A Story of Passion

Bilgün Dereli

B-Point
Bilgun Dereli
A Story of Passion
The Grand Bazaar:  where the love blossoms

You would not believe me if I told you that this story started when I was 10.  But it is true for the most part.  I was 10 years old when my mother and I had our first visit  to the Grand Bazaar.  As I entered through the stone archway that heralded the Grand Bazaar, I felt like I was the only guest invited to a visual feast set up exclusively in my name.  I felt dizzy and I forgot about my mother holding my hand tightly and stopping every now and then at a shop window to study the interiors carefully; I forgot about my dream where my prince charming was giving me a nice little wake-up kiss; I forgot about my friend who had broken my heart for the stupidest reasons; I forgot about the homework that kept on preoccupying my mind.  Everyhting else just dissolved into the bright daylight flowing through the high vaulted ceiling and the brighter glitter of gold and white colours beneath, so bright as to overshadow the daylight.


My mother was an exceptional guide in jewellery.  We would visit the exact same shops every time we went there.  She knew her way through in that glittery world where I felt at a complete loss.  She always knew what she was looking for.  She never made a mistake in the quality and the value of any piece of jewellery.  No, she was not a connoisseur or a jeweller, but she had an infallible intuition about jewels.  And I believe she passed it on to me.
Charm is not all about how something looks; it comes the fragrance, aroma, texture and voice as well.  What I am getting at is the Spice Market(aka the Egyptian Bazaar), the usual last stop on our trips with my mother.  As you very well know, the air in the market is filled with the pleasant and appetising scents of saffron, bay leaves, fresh or dried mint, healing teas, herbs and oils.  And you somehow feel some incredible peace on mind.  As my eyes – previously dazzled by the Grand Bazaar – find some time to rest up in the Spice Market, then my nose takes over to experience something extraordinary.


So, a trip around the Grand Bazaar is an exhilarating experience that enhances all you emotions, even the most reserved and private ones.  It is also a source of inspiration for me.  Just like the Turkish women.  What makes the women in this part of the world so alluring is not the sexual appeal but the charm.  And this is not the kind of charm that manifests itself openly.  It is the mysterious kind, and therefore it is rousing; it is secretly seductive.  That is what I seek in my designs; the kind of jewellery that embodies the beauty of this breed.  And because of what I aspire to achieve, I have to try quite hard.  Maybe that is why I continue ceaselessly with the unique, unchanging enthusiasm I had at the beginning.   
 
What are my sources of inspiration?
Once you are on the road, what once seemed foggy suddenly clears up in front of you.  When you begin your toil in creating things, you suddenly come to understand how rich and yielding can be the part of you that has been waiting silently for its turn.  Virtually anything can entice me: The old and contemporary Istanbul, the Bosphorus, the smell of the sea, the chaos, and of course my daughters, especially my daughters… The love I cherish for them, their love makes my heart tremble…I am touched by their songs, their laughter, the pictures of them, the stories they tell, the loves they live and the thrills they encounter.  I feel composed, satisfied when I know like what I have designed.  I enjoy it when my pieces have something from me and reflect the youth they stand for.
Painting and music inspire me.  Sometimes a song, sometimes a painting drifts me away and fills me away and fills me with the enthusiasm to go back to my atelier and create.  The travels abroad and international fairs give me a whole new persperctive by exposing me to the new trends, new materials.  There, I discover possibilities to recite a different World with our own forms.   
 
How do I (we) work?
It all begins individually but culminates with intense team work.  I start with a quick sketch of what engages my mind on the nearest available thing… the palm of my hand… a piece of candle wax in my bag…Just as a writer taking notes, I play with wax; sometimes a piece of play-dough does the trick.  I should admit that the making is more painstaking than the creation phase.  Therefore, I spend a considerable length of time in my atelier.  It is tremendous effort, and fortitude is needed to realize what is envisaged.  I just love experimenting with materials that are novel, sometimes bizarre, merging opposites, expanding the dimensions.  And of course I love distorting  a classical form to give it a new and contemporary look, relentlessly challangind myself.  The master artisan I work with – I prefer using the term ‘sadekar’ in Turkish, tha master lapidary – encourages and guides me into experimenting new ways.  I would not feel this free to proudly present my Works if it were not fort his team of the master lapidary(sadekar) and the gem setter(‘mıhlayıcı’ in Turkish).  I have to say that I am very lucky to have found the virtuosos to share my passion.

Integrity, beauty and a point
As I pointed out at the beginning, the seeds of this passion were imbedded on the very first day I set my foot in the narrow streets of the Grand Bazaar washed in the silver and golden glitter of the shop Windows.  What has stayed unchanged since that day has been the unconquarable thrill of that first love.  Whenever I take a tour around the Grand Bazaar now, I reunite with the excitement of my childhood and my mother’s unfailing, sensitive eyes.  Reunite is the word.  As women of a more modern World, I believe, we reunite in this bazaar with our past, going futher back, with the oriental vibes that is inherent in our genes.  The outsiders get fascinated by this whole new World they have not encountered before, whereas it is a Reunion for us.

It is a Reunion of this kind I endeavour to seek the Bpoint jewellery.  I mean to reconcile lots of seemingly conflicting concepts bu fusing them together my designs.  I do not hesitate to explore new things, and eventually I see that they uniquely blend together; they in fact reunite…the East and the West, affection with lust, mystery with charm, the new with the old, romanticism with passion, the far with the near, the imagination with reality, the traditional with the future, emotions with logic.  I feel they can enjoy each other’s company and I am so pleased with this matchmaking I conduce.

It is a cliche but I will use it anyways; there is not a written rule for looking beautiful.  Even if there is, I am reminded bu so many captivating and special women that such a rule is to be ignored.  You are beautiful if you feel yourself complete with what you wear, with what you carry.  For me there is only one rule and that is this; To feel united…

Accessories are what complete your clothes.  Accessories are to clothes just like what a full stop is to a sentence.  As I design my jewellery, I hope to make women feel happy, contented and complete, and as infallible as the full stop at the end of a sentence.  Nothing that I do not like nor I cannot carry myself can find itself a place in the B Point Collections.

I proudly present you the jewellery designed with affection, excitement and passion.

May love be with you…
B

 

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