![]() Neat and small scale, it was made up in gold or silver metal with little ornamentation. Tailored jewelry was the most conservative accessory in the 1950s. ![]() Rhinestones were standard, produced in a rainbow of colors including white, black, pink, blue, yellow, and iridescent, which was an innovation. Dresses and suits in heavy, rough-textured fabrics were weighty enough to support the hunky, oversized circles, ovals, snowflake, or starburst-shaped brooches (associated with the atomic bomb), typically three-dimensional. Clothing concealed most of a woman's body, and only chokers, earrings, bracelets (notably charm bracelets), and brooches were visible. Postwar fashion succumbed to couturier Christian Dior's highly structured New Look, followed by a series of equally severe styles: the chemise, sheathe, trapeze, and sack dress. Patriotic jewelry completely vanished during peacetime. Two notable Mexican artisans who worked in silver, Rebajes and Spratling, had their sophisticated jewelry featured at top department stores across the country. As Mexico was America's wartime ally, jewelry imported from that country and its imitations was highly fashionable. In the summer of 1940, "V" for victory was a popular design. Costume jewelry also took on a militaristic theme, and miniature model tanks, airplanes, battleships, jeeps, soldiers, and even hand grenades were made up in metal or wood and worn as brooches, necklaces, and earrings. Patriotic motifs flourished during wartime, ranging from red, white, and blue to all-American motifs related to California, Hawaii, Native American Indians, and cowboys. There was little difference between quirky, childish, commercially made jewelry and what the women made themselves following do-it-yourself instructions published in magazines. Women wore hand-carved wooden brooches, necklaces of multicolored painted shells, cork, and bits of drift-wood. They also fashioned jewelry from humble materials that were readily available during wartime: pumpkin seeds, nuts, shells, olive pits, clay, leather, felt, yarn, and even upholstery fabrics. Desperate costume jewelers bought beaded sweaters, evening dresses, and even stage costumes, and harvested their beads, rhinestones, and pearls. Black plastic was the substitute for nineteenth-century jet.ĭuring World War II, imports from Europe were cut off, and many jewelry materials were also restricted. Victorian styles were copied directly from the originals: lockets, cameos, chokers, even hat pins. It was usually plated with real gold (pink, white, yellow) or sterling silver. Rococo jewelry, associated with the Empress Eugenie, was typically frivolous bow-knots, swags and ribbon curves, sparingly ornamented with large, faux-semiprecious cut stones. This silly jewelry lightened up the lapels of the fashionable severe and sober, fitted suits.Īt the same time, the romantic rococo and Victorian styles flourished, lingering into the 1940s. Clips could be deconstructed into separate pieces. Influenced by the lively antics of cartoons, jewelry also had movable parts: Brooches and necklaces were adorned with "trembler" flowers, hanging plastic fruit, or charms. The queen of whimsy, Schiaparelli put metal insects and caterpillars on necklaces, and her brooches ranged from miniature musical instruments, roller skates, harlequins, blackamoors, and ostriches. Toy-like novelty accessories (both costume and precious jewelry) were wildly popular, inspired by the Surrealists, couturier Elsa Schiaparelli, and Walt Disney's cartoons. In the mid-1930s, fashion's palette turned Technicolor, as plastic was produced in bright colors for the first time and metal jewelry was hand-enameled to add color. Chanel's signature necklace in 1939 was a massive East Indian- inspired bib of faux pearls, uncut emeralds, ruby beads, and dangling metal pieces with a cord tie. The Colonial Exhibition in Paris in 1931 and the New York World's Fair in 1939 expanded the vocabulary of foreign influences, and rough, raw, "barbaric" materials (real and imitation), including ivory (and faux versions), bone, amber, wood, and even cork, were used for over-scale jewelry. Egyptian motifs were inspired by the discovery of Tutankhamen's tomb in 1922. Beginning in the 1920s and continuing throughout the 1930s, fashion and jewelry shared a multitude of influences including Art Deco, the Far East, North Africa, and India. ![]()
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