Jaguar Quetzal

Histoires De Carres > Spring - Summer 2018

The "jaguar warriors" of the pre-Columbian Astec civilisation inspired Alice Shirley to dream up this big cat and its superb headdress, which is loosely inspired by the famous Penacho conserved in the Museum of Ethnology, Vienna. Made of feathers and semi-precious stones, this enormous headdress owes its beauty to the brilliance of more than 400 quetzal feathers. The quetzal is a tropical bird that lives in Central and South America, whose Aztec means "long green feathers". The designer, who is passionate about the animal world, gives us a tender portrait: a sleeping jaguar "dreaming of freedom".