Meet the Hong Kong Designer Behind Hollywood’s Most Striking Accessories
Bertrand Mak doesn’t design for trends or time—he designs for the enduring weight of meaning
The reluctant architect of desire
It is a curious thing, to have your work walk the Oscars red carpet before the world even knows your name.
But Bertrand Mak, founder of Sauvereign, is not curious about recognition.
When Brady Corbet stepped onto Hollywood’s biggest stage wearing a brooch inspired by Brutalism—a movement more often associated with hulking structures than fine accessories—Bertrand’s presence was felt, if not loudly announced. It suited him just fine.
The Hong Kong designer does not have a background in design, nor does he particularly align himself with the structures of formal training.
“My inspirations are simply from my surroundings, my childhood memories, from what I have seen and experienced, bounced off my gut and intuition,” he says.
His process is less about deliberate architectural homage and more about osmosis—memories of buildings, materials, and forms resurfacing at unexpected moments. He is not designing blueprints, after all. He is designing emotion.
That emotion takes the shape of objects that could be heirlooms if time moved just a little quicker. The Brutalist brooch for Brady was, in Bertrand’s words, “cerebral, emotional, demanding speed and conviction.”
It had to be solemn. It had to be dignified. But above all, it had to be necessary.
“The right thing at the wrong time is the wrong thing,” he muses, suggesting that the ephemeral nature of trends holds little sway over him. His creations are designed to endure.
An obsession with time
This might explain his affinity for horology—particularly the vintage kind, where techniques are lost faster than they are learned.
“The rarity, scholarship, originality, age-old techniques that are lost and no longer seen in the present day,” he lists.
Hard enamel dials, for example, are “such beauties” whose know-how has been irretrievably lost. It is grief for craftsmanship that will never return.
But he is not stuck in the past. “A contemporary piece by Kari Voutilainen can excite me just as much, if not more.”
Kari is, in fact, Bertrand’s latest collaborator. The Finnish watchmaker—who recently won the GPHG 2024 Men’s Watch Prize—has joined forces with Sauvereign on a collection that bridges timekeeping and ornamentation.
Their first major work together, the HS14 Gem Brooch worn by Cillian Murphy at last year’s Oscars, was 15 years in the making.
The future of craft in a digital world
Bertrand, ever the contrarian, is skeptical of design’s current trajectory. He worries about the role of AI in creativity—not because he fears technology itself, but because he fears what it erases.
“Technology should be the bicycle for the human mind,” he says, borrowing a quote from Steve Jobs.
It should not replace curiosity, nor absolve designers of the responsibility to understand their craft beyond the glow of a screen.
“Many of the creations today are already characterized by carelessness, unfit for purpose with no commitment to long term.”
For all his devotion to permanence, Bertrand’s work is also intensely personal.
He designs what he himself wants to wear, to own, and to pass down. There is no separation between the man and his craft.
“My creations are a mirror of my journeys,” he utters. He does not chase iconography. He does not seek legacy.
But still, his pieces have a way of marking time—on the wrist, on the lapel, in the hands of those who understand that meaning is the most valuable material of all.
Special thanks Amalissa Hall and Katie Forster
