Tea at Trianon: Vintage Brooches

John Wilson Croker on Marie-Antoinette

"We have followed the history of Marie Antoinette with the greatest diligence and scrupulosity. We have lived in those times. We have talked with some of her friends and some of her enemies; we have read, certainly not all, but hundreds of the libels written against her; and we have, in short, examined her life with– if we may be allowed to say so of ourselves– something of the accuracy of contemporaries, the diligence of inquirers, and the impartiality of historians, all combined; and we feel it our duty to declare, in as a solemn a manner as literature admits of, our well-matured opinion that every reproach against the morals of the queen was a gross calumny– that she was, as we have said, one of the purest of human beings."

~from History of the Guillotine by John Wilson Croker, 1844

Edmund Burke on Marie-Antoinette

"It is now sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the queen of France, then dauphiness, at Versailles; and surely there never lighted on this orb, which she hardly seemed to touch, a more delightful vision. I saw her just above the horizon, decorating and cheering the elevated sphere she had just begun to move in, glittering like a morning star full of life and splendor and joy. Oh, what a revolution....Little did I dream that I should have lived to see such disasters fall upon her, in a nation of gallant men, in a nation of men of honor and of cavaliers! I thought ten thousand swords must have leaped from their scabbards, to avenge even a look which threatened her with insult. But the age of chivalry is gone; that of sophisters, economists, and calculators has succeeded...."

~Edmund Burke, October 1790

Monday, March 15, 2021

Vintage Brooches

From Gracie Opulanza:

An example of how to use vintage pins in a modern way. Create a wedding bouquet out of a collection. There’s a subset of folks in the vintage dressing and collecting niche who wear and collect vintage brooches. Some are pure collectors, some like to wear their purchases and some like to do other fun stuff with their finds, like make vintage brooch bouquets out them (see above).
Nowadays, although women still wear brooches and designers still design them, the heyday for brooches in the fashion world existed from about the 1920s to the 1970s.

There has been some recent renewed interest in brooch wearing in the last decade or so (think Gossip Girl) and there’s plenty of vintage-esque designs on the market at shops like Anthropologie and real vintage brooches at Etsy, the online marketplace for handmade and vintage goods if you are looking to add some to your own jewellery box.

But first, it’s probably a good idea to have a little knowledge before you get started. So, who were the big costume jewellery vintage brooch designers of the past and what were their most popular designs? (Read more.)