Style Edit: Inside Bulgari’s iconic contemporary B.Zero1 line – inspired by the Roman Colosseum and created with modern techniques, the Italian jewellery collection continues to evolve

In 1999, Bulgari rewrote the rules of contemporary jewellery design with a groundbreaking new collection known as B.Zero1. Nearly a quarter of a century later, it continues to be one of the most instantly recognisable and successful jewellery collections in the world – but it also continues to surprise and delight with its head-turning new variations.

Bulgari is closely intertwined with the city of Rome, where it has been based since it was founded as a jeweller’s shop in 1884, and it’s the Eternal City that provides the collection with its storied inspiration – specifically, the fluid geometry of the world’s oldest amphitheatre, the Colosseum.

The modern comes in the form of the industrial tubing that also inspires the collection – an innovation that has required Bulgari to invent an entire new technique, Tubogas, which is used to create the spiral tubes with hollow, cylindrical cores.

The various rings in the B.Zero1 collection feature between one and five bands in their central section, surrounded on either side by flat rings that prominently display the Bulgari logo. The collection’s name combines the “B” of the brand name with “Zero” to mark the start of the new millennium when the collection was launched, with “1” for the new beginnings the era ushered in. It very quickly gained iconic status and became a massive hit: since its introduction, more than two million B.Zero1 rings have been sold worldwide.

In recent years, a collection that has held innovation as its hallmark since the outset has continued to make waves with a range of new varieties.