About Cameo Jewellery - Vintage Antique & Cameos of Today

Cameos have been around since ancient times and are still being produced today.
They reflect classical history, artistic imagination, literature and fashion of the day amongst many other subjects .

Pendant ornament with cameo, Italian 1550 - 1600

Reproduced by gracious permission of  her Majesty The Queen
Central cameo 13 century or later? Italian. Enamel decoration, precious stones & semi precious onyx. Surround cameos added in the 16th & 18th century.
Royal Windsor Collection 

City of Birmingham Museum and Art gallery Exhibition of gemstones and jewellery catalogue, 1960.

A cameo does not have to be made from shell or a semi precious materials to be a real cameo. In terms any material that is produced with the raised profile or image that projects above the background of the stone is correct and truthfully can be called a cameo.

 Both vintage cameos. Top vintage shell cameo 1940s Below vintage cameo brooch signed Sphinx

vintage cameo jewellery at www.jewelsandfinery.co.uk

So cameos produced of shell both hand carved and machine carved, semi precious stones like quartz, malachite, onyx, jasper and lapis lazuli to name a few. Opal and moonstone are relatively new semi precious materials used to produce a cameo. Hard stone was first used in production but other natural made materials include jet, coral, ivory, lava and bone were used in abundance. Glass, ceramic and china is still widely used and also many forms of plastics. Bakelite, galalith and celluloid are early forms of plastic and in their day were seen as cheap options; but now their prices are rising and are very collectible. The Queen has a fabulous collection of cameo jewellery many in precious gems such as diamonds.

Cameo Parure of the Empress Josephine. French.

The parure consisted of a crown, a lesser cornal, ear rings, bracelet, slide and comb. All set with cameos in gold, decorated with blue enamel. Crown, comb and clasp are set with carnelians, the rest with onyx and shell. BC Museum and Art Gallery, Exhibition of gemstones and jewellery catalogue, 1960.      

Cameo were produced firstly by hand carving but when machines became a way to increase production they are were molded, cast, stamped or carved. However hand carved cameo production still continues today. Always view a shell cameo with a lens or magnifier. Hand carved cameos do not have the minute "snow effect" around the edge of the profile where it joins the background, which machine or ultrasonically produced "carved" cameos have. Today fashion cameos used in jewellery, tend to be the one recognizable profile which I have christened  "The Popular Goddess" mass produced in many different forms of fashion or costume jewellery or used as embellishment on shoes, clothes and furnishing.

     

The Popular Goddess cameo bracelet - pre owned jewellery on Jewels and Finery SOLD

Fashion has seen cameo jewellery raise in popularity in the Victorian era until the fifties and sixties. It waned in fashion in the seventies but has never gone away - as there has always been a minority that love and wear cameos. Which has meant that cameos have continued in production to today.   

Cameo collecting is very much personnel taste, many collect just shell cameo and others jet and lava. But there is a growing number who collect plastic and glass cameos. It does not have to be a collection that has large monetary or investment value of today. Fashion will influence the value of antiques (items over 100 years old) and vintage (any item about 25 years old to a hundred) So what is bought at a high price today may depreciate in value in a few years. And of course the reverse happens - items that are of low value in their times, lava and early plastics for example have in relatively few years command a high value now.

D & E vintage cameo jewellery taken from Juliana Jewelry Reference DeLizza & Elster, identification and value guide by Ann Pitman (previously reviewed on this blog)

Vintage cameo jewellery that is of glass and plastic produced by designer and manufacturers: for example D & E and Sphinx, are commanding quite high prices in today's market. But it could easily be Exquisite, Hollywood or the mass produced cameo The Popular Goddess" in the future Who can predict?

Collecting is up to the individual and should be fun and affordable to each individuals taste.

The Reicharts cameo factory manufacturing a broad range of colours in ultrasonically created cameos.

Cameos Old and New 4th Edition by Anna M Miller (Previously reviewed on this blog) 

Cameos Old & New Anna M Miller - Book Review

At the beginning of this year, I decided to buy a book a month. Each book would be to increase my knowledge about antique and vintage jewellery. So far I have brought 2 books a month - okay so I can't count LOL

The truth is I love book and can not wait for my latest purchase to arrive. So when the 4Th edition of Cameos Old and New by Anna M Miller which has been revised and updated by Diana Jarrett caught my eye - It just had to buy it.
I already have the 3rd edition and was very pleased to find the latest books on cameos contained more excellent information

The book is for anyone new to cameos, experienced collectors, jewellery dealers and also curators.
It is a fully comprehensive reference guide to:

• Where to hunt for cameos
• How to recognize - old from new, imitation and newer synthetic materials from original shell or stone cameos
• How to differentiate between ultrasonically produced and hand carved cameos

 The book has loads more pages of photographs than the last, with the new cameo's illustrated that are being made today. Extensive and well written chapters on cameos from their history, materials past and present to today's worldwide cameo designers 
Overall well worth buying if you are interested in cameos.
Taken from the book three examples that are included in the list of the twenty most common subjects of cameos:
The three muses, Medusa and profile of an anonymous female; the lady cameo that is mass produced in stone and shell.

My interest in cameos has included the twentieth and twenty first century costume jewellery type.
Particularly the one profile that is seen most often, I have christened her the popular goddess!
She does differ across productions as some vintage and second hand ones tend to be plainer, where as some ones she is molded more beautiful with flowing clothes, hair and flowers.  Some of the ones produced have a point at the end of her nose instead of round.

 

Seventies vintage cameo earrings clip on style

Notice the profile of the popular goddess is quite plain

Again the cameo on this choker - she is plain in detail

Estimate the choker is sixties to early seventies.

 

  

 

  

 

Note the last three have a sharper point to her nose

These cameos have been produced in all different types of jewellery with a variety of coloured backgrounds. From bracelets, necklaces, brooches, earrings and scarf clips. Even on the heel of  a shoe or front!

http://www.zazzle.co.uk/cameo+shoes
Link for above shoes

http://www.wedgwoodmuseum.org.uk/collections/themes/2333/theme/2440/object/2685#2685
Elegant shoe produced by Wedgwood and information on their cameos 

Jewels and Finery Vintage Cameo Jewellery
Selection of our antique and vintage cameo jewellery. More jewels to be added soon as we have them photographed and ready to list

Just have fun collecting and wearing cameos what ever they are made of or age.

Next book review will be one about Kenneth J Lane's jewellery and life, so please feel free to bookmark this blog


 

 

Vintage Brooches added recently to Jewels and Finery

Just a quick blog to say we have added a few more vintage brooches in the last few days
Below is an antique brooch from Scotland.

Antique Scottish Thistle Brooch

Then we have added some cameo brooches including this bar one of the three muses


Vintage Cameo Brooch Three Muse

A vintage signed brooch from Napier of a green eyed owl


Vintage Green Eyed Owl Brooch Signed Napier


Just a few of the brooches for sale added to the website in the last few days. More to be added today and through out this week

Brooches are ideal for adding to clothes - Either wear on a lapel of a jacket or coat, on a T-shirt, add to a bag or to a hat. They just brighten up your outfit. Vintage brooches are often better made than more recent ones and of a huge variety from floral, birds, animals, contemporary, comical, figural, names, sun, moon, stars and so many more..........

Jewels and Finery

Vintage Jewellery listed recently

Leaf Cluster Necklace signed Jewelcraft


We have been updating and moving products in the last 3 weeks. Almost finished and hope to have sorted the site by the end of this week!!

Have so much to add to Jewels and Finery soon

We have however added these pieces in the last couple of weeks

Vintage Parrot Brooch Pin

Silver Wedgwood Medusa Cameo Necklace


A beautiful necklace in a silver metalic green enamel by Jewelcraft who also came under the name Coro

A cheerful vintage parrot pin brooch, ideal for a hat or t-shirt. Very well made piece of vintage jewellery

And last but not least a silver sterling cameo pendant and chain. The cameo is of medusa and was produced by Wedgwood and so is ideal to collect because the company is no longer producing jewellery

We just have to finish our range of craft books (mostly used books and some new ones) and then the patterns. Then we can continue to add the large amount of beautiful vintage and antique jewellery, beads, buttons and books. Not mentioning the patterns and findings, etc

In the last few weeks we have also been photographing the Christmas jewellery for adding in late August. Found it strange to be thinking about Christmas in the summer months but it is something that has to be organized

Our next blogs will be on cleaning vintage buttons and also an update on Exquisite - their Scottish brooches. Hopefully before the weekend is out!!

Antique & Vintage Cameo Jewellery

Cameos have been around for centuries. Still very popular today. Whilst looking at antique jewellery at a fair the other day, we overheard a young girl getting very excited over a selection of cameo brooches and was having a hard time deciding what to buy.
Unlike many vintage jewellery dealers, we now actively source cameos both old and more modern
Unlike many cameo enthusiasts we actually like the modern cameos that depict the popular goddess. She fascinates us - who actually first produced her? From our acquired knowledge she appeared around the late sixties and is still used today

So as cameos span all ages we have now started an antique and vintage cameo section on Jewels and Finery. At present we have uploaded two newly sourced pieces of cameo jewellery. All the cameo pictured can be found on our site

Antique Vintage Cameo category

Popular Goddess