Silver Gilt 18th C. Brooch Stomacher

What to do…what to do… when one didn't quite have the gold Louis or Spanish Reales in the velvet money purse to wear gems and gold? Just leave that quandary to the jewelers of the 1700s. It was they who were frequently the most innovative of all the artisans for herein lays the solution: take silver gilt (a fine layer of gold laid atop silver) and add puffs of faceted metal to capture and refract the light as a jewel would. Combine it with an archetypal three (3) part design and ensure it has a bow or Sevigné as it was known in the 18th century. Add a smaller middle drop, a pendant drop and make it grand. The ultimate outcome: a jewel as eye-catching and ultimate today as it was some 250 years ago.

Measuring 3-¾ inches high by 2-1/4 inches at the widest (9.5 cm high by 5.7 cm wide). Construction is hollow; regal yet light in weight. Condition: wear to the surfaces with some silver showing (particularly on the highest points); one small scroll on the left side lost. General light to medium wear; later brooch fittings were added with a safety clasp. Wish us to add a pendant bale? Easily done and this becomes a pendant as well. It is Continental in origin, possibly French. See the book "Bijoux de regions de Francais" on page 187 for an almost exact example. Choosing something that no one else possesses is indescribable.