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History - The Craftsmanship of Victorian Jewelry - Part 1
This article focuses on the craftsmanship of jewelry so as
to encourage you to look more closely at your pieces for
the evidence of fine skills and design. If you have a
knowledge of the skills used to make the jewelry it will
lead you to a greater appreciation of its beauty and aid
you in dating Antique Jewelry
History - The Craftsmanship of Victorian Jewelry - Part 1
Let's start
with
Catches and Hinges. Sometimes you can detect
the age of a piece by the catch/hinge. However, keep in
mind that over the years these may have been replaced,
leaving you to find other ways of dating your piece. The
"C" catch is the earliest type and following that in about
1895 a safety type catch was used for a brief period of
time. Sort of like the third catch you see from the right
in the picture. Around the 1920's the present day type
safety catch caught on even though a safety catch had been
used by some since about 1912. The Trombone clasp is
primarily found on European jewelry from the 1940's though
it was very popular back in the 1890's as well. The clasp
alone will not date a piece as you will see. As far as the
hinges go... there are basically two types that are
prominent in costume jewelry - the ball hinge (c 1890),
which has variations; with one type you grip the pin by
tightening the sides of the hinge as in the second example
from the right in the picture shown. Another note: Better
quality jewelry brooches usually had a small loop at the
back for attaching a safety chain. On many pins I've come
across, there has been the loop or even an O ring... but
the safety chain was missing. These often broke over the
years and weren't replaced. The tube hinge as shown in the
photo is the earlier hinge - pre 1890's.
 Brooches
during the Victorian era were often formed as a hollow
structure known as holloware. This was done partly to
reduce the cost but also to reduce the weight - heavy
brooches cause damage to delicate fabrics and tend to sag
on the material. When you feel a piece of holloware you
are aware of it's light weight, however, you might also
notice the presence of tiny breather holes in the back -
this allowed soldering to be carried out when the when the
piece was being made. The problem with holloware is that
is was very often made using very thin metal so it was
easily dented and crushed. Very few pieces survived in
mint condition. Also there was a tendency for the metal to
tear around the stress points of the hinge and latch. This
type of damage is difficult to repair
Note
stress points on the back of the brooch.
Repoussé
Repoussé is a method of imparting a raised design or
pattern to a flat sheet of metal by punching the forms in
from the back. The metal is supported on a block of pitch
(sometimes made of wood) which provides a cushion for the
forming of areas which have to be raised by the carefully
using a series of punches with rounded tips. Since not all
of the detailed work can be done this way the metal is
turned over and the finer details of the design are
punched in from the front, once again with the pitch
supporting the metal. The use of steel punches this way is
called Chasing. Repoussé is a time consuming task and was
mostly used on the larger, more valuable pieces in Western
Jewelry.
An example
of the Repoussé Technique
PART TWO
COLLECTIBLE JEWELS
http://www.collectiblejewels.com
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Reprinted with permission
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