That Necklace Is a Rivière Not a Riviera

French is the language of love and jewelry. Actually, in the literal sense, French is possibly more in the language of jewelry than love.

It is because so many styles originated in Paris and the French jewelry terms given to several things have remained part of jewelry jargon. Some words that don’t have an English translation are bijoux, minaudière, and en tremblant. Rivière is one of the most prevalent.

After seeing Sarah Jessica Parker in a vintage Fred Leighton diamond rivière at last week’s Golden Globes Golden Eve event, where she received the Carol Burnett Award, and Anna Wintour who was out and about in her signature stack of rivières during the holidays, I started thinking about how the term has been mangled, changed and dropped entirely.

How do you pronounce rivière?

Rivière is pronounced differently in English than in French. While the French say ree-vyer, Americans tend to pronounce it riv-ee-air.

I believe this is one root of the confusion because some Americans add an “a” sound to the end of the word. They say riviera (ree-vee-air-uh), as in the French Riviera on the Mediterranean. There is another pretty baseless theory on the “riviera” usage and I’ll get to that below.

The riviera rename not only happens with civilians who don’t speak the jewelry language every day. Jewelry design houses label their rivière necklaces rivieras. So, the error is being passed on by people who should know better. And that’s not all that’s happened to the good old rivière.