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Emily Stoehrer, PhD

Jewelry Curator | Fashion Historian

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About me
Exhibitions
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News

Publications

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Thank you @chrisroyercollections for the beautiful reminder - Elsa (@elsaperetti.official) loved the idea of having this dress from your collection paired with one of her belt design from the @mfaboston collection. An extraordinary tribute to a great designer. Her legacy lives on.

Ever wonder about the past lives of jewelry? This marsh bird brooch by Charles Robert Ashbee - now at the @mfaboston - began life as a hair comb. Thankfully the original design is documented in this 1906 illustration published by the Guild of Handicraft. As tastes shifted in the early 20th century, the flowing tresses preferred by women during the art nouveau and the arts and crafts era gave way to the short avant-garde hairstyles of la garçonne. And, by the 1920s, who needed a haircomb?! This brooch always makes me think of the Gift of the Magi. Perhaps it’s not surprising that the story was first published in 1905, just a year before this haircomb debuted at the Guild of Handicraft. The plique-a-jour enamel would have been striking in the stylish up-dos worn in the early years of the twentieth-century. The beauty of the light through the enamel - set above the hair - is lost in its re-design as a brooch where the body would have obscured the details of the technique. #jewelryhistory #jewelry #fashion #artsandcraftsjewelry #guildofhandicraft #charlesrobertashbee

During the 1920s and 1930s, Hollywood films and magazines broadly disseminated fashion styles and influenced how jewelry was thought about (dreamed about!) and worn. As actresses and tastemakers appeared wearing stacks of gemset bracelets, women seeking to emulate those styles turned to costume jewelry - more affordable this jewelry was mass produced in in materials glass, plastic, and base metal made to look like platinum, diamonds and colored gemstones. Bracelets, like the four extraordinary examples seen here, would have been available at department stores. Looking to Hollywood, Paris, and New York these jewels were designed with fashion fantasies in mind.

Art Deco jewelry is divine. At the @mfaBoston we have a small but stellar collection of fine jewelry dating to the 1920s. A favorite is this rectangular brooch by Lacloche that features buff-top ruby blossoms with delicate onyx branches and a black enamel frame from about 1925. With its rectangular shape, I imagine it was the perfect belt-brooch, worn at the waistline, of one of the decade’s simple black dresses. Swipe to see a stunning black chiffon and velvet version called Flore from Lucien Lelong’s winter 1925 collection. It features a jeweled buckle and a “skirt cut into petals.” Think about a dress like this with the Lacloche brooch – perfection. This brooch was owned by England’s Mary of Teck. In 1952 she gave it to the actress Angela Dowding when she married the queen’s cousin Gerald Laselles. A note the accompanies the brooch, written on small stationary from Queen Mary’s home “Marlborough House,” reads: For Angela from Mary R, 1952.

A box of chocolates for you. When did Valentine’s day become like Halloween? There is so much (too much) candy in my house. This gold and druzy brooch by the Japanese artist Etsuko Sonobe reminds me a jewel-like candy box. Sonobe received the Diamond International Award in 1983 and since then her work has been featured in exhibitions around the globe. The artist explains, ““I think the simpler the constituent element is, the greater the surprise of shape and function that can be expected…I believe being free from a fixed idea is important to producing new jewelry with enjoyment.”

Happy Valentine’s Day! Known as the Marlbough Gem, an unusual procession unfolds on this cameo. In the center of a group of winged figures, a torchbearer leads a veiled couple—Cupid (Love), holding a dove, and Psyche (Soul)—by a knotted ribbon. Although this scene was often interpreted as a wedding procession, it resembles depictions of ancient initiation rites into mystery cults.

Emily Stoehrer, PhD, Blog at WordPress.com.

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