My brother and I were first introduced to the Victorian era through our fathers childhood stamp collecting, he always recounts how in his search for stamps he kept coming across these weird and wonderful Victorian trinkets and keepsakes made of silver. Somehow this sparked a passion in our father which is still very much alive today! He absolutely can lose himself when coming across an old design from the past. We can still see his fascination with these small trinkets like pillboxes and perfume bottle and what my brother and I found even stranger was how much he loves lorgnettes – I mean lorgnettes’ really? But yes really, I mean I guess he genuinely has passion for the creativity and creation of what is indeed a great design era that has and still is ever present in nearly all walks of life today!
Victorian decorative art reflects a true myriad of historic styles/influences from the Middle East and Asia; in fact nearly all things including but not limited to furniture, fittings, interior, personal accessories and jewellery but it is these areas which have been integral to our professional lives and our collective design ethos.
I always remember reading “The sun never sets on the British Empire” and thinking just how much influence, good and bad, the Victorian era is responsible for. Britain established an enormous empire spanning the four corners of the earth from which a wealth of cultural influences were taken and indeed thrived in British society. Victorian design was excess, lavish and in it lay the roots of another great design period, the romantic Art Nouveau style, but we will leave that for another post J
Only when it comes to the jewellery of the era can I kind of understand the passion I see in my father’s eyes when he talks about Victorian style keepsakes. I always loved the amethyst and aquamarine set Victorian designs – I guess some kids like to just play with lego and toy soldiers but even though I did like the so called “normal” stuff too, I saw these pieces of jewellery in my fathers showroom when I used to work preparing orders for McDonalds money, and I thought he was a pirate or something – always travelling and he had all this treasure, anyway I was hooked and wanted to be a pirate too or in my case Indiana Jones to be specific!
Some facts about Victorian style jewellery:
Fine silver jewellery became trendy and in demand as Britain slowly moved into the Victorian period. As most of the most impressive items of Victorian style jewellery were handmade, silver was the perfect precious metal for setting stones because of its softness and ease in which it can be worked with and produce a bright luster. During this period many gemstones, including round rose cut diamonds, were set in silver together with popular coloured gemstones including deeper shades of amethyst, golden topaz, garnet and shell cameos.
By the middle of the Victorian era the industrial revolution was in full swing and the fine handcrafted designs of silver jewellery evolved into more manufactured pieces and circa 1852 a method for cutting and stamping out silver settings was developed which really allowed jewellery to be made rapidly and in turn relatively inexpensively.
In fact interestingly it is one of our greatest monarchs, Queen Victoria herself whom has a lot to answer for in terms of jewellery at and of this time. Queen Victoria went into mourning after her beloved husband died and wore only black until her death, and a new style of jewellery emerged using blackened oxidised silver set with dark stones such as black onyx & amethyst, this style becoming known as silver ‘mourning’ jewellery. As a direct result of ‘mourning’ jewellery, designs with an air of sentimentality became popular and wearing silver lockets, miniature silver photo frames and engraved or monogramed jewellery commemorating those lost but not forgotten became common in the jewellery world. And even more relevant today is this charm craze by brands like Pandora and Tomas Sabo and how these would not have existed without Queen Victoria as it was the evolution of mourning jewellery that lead to the conception of Charms in the Western world!
We salute you, your majesty for services rendered to the British realm and fashionistas everywhere! The Victorian design era is unrivalled and beautiful and I hope perhaps I have sparked someone else’s inertest in this great period of time for our country and for the world in general!
The Silver With Emotion Blog 