Late 1940's watercolor pen drawing by Larry Austin of a decorative necklace designed
by Frank Hess.

Miriam Haskell creativita e passione (reprinted with permission from  ORNAMENTA  6/97)

Costume jewellery for the woman on the street and not imitation real jewellery that was so fashionable in the States during the thirties. A style that made Miriam Haskell one of the greatest and most successful producers of fantasy bijoux.

When anyone talks about American costume jewellery, the immediate image that flashes in your mind is that fashion for false jewellery launched by the Hollywood stars. But among the extraordinary producers of costume jewellery during the American Depression there were designers that followed other sources of inspiration like Miriam Haskell, who first launched pieces inspired by popular traditions. 

Some of her work in seed pearls remind us of popular jewellery from the south of Italy in the eighteen hundreds, with burnished metalwork and tiny, irregular pearls, while the pieces in coral spheres take us back to ornaments from Trapani. Her costume jewellery also stands out for its workmanship. The decorative pieces were assembled or inserted by hand on a metal or plastic filigree base. It was a style that Haskell managed to express in perfect synchrony with the designers she worked with and when she left the company the creative department continued their work in the same spirit.

We are including a Miriam Haskell collection of pieces created between 1930 and 1980. The photographs are from a book on Miriam Haskell’s jewellery by Deanna Farneti Cera, published by Idea Books.

Matching necklace with pendent and brooch. Semi-spherical shapes and glass interspaces, silvery metals, roses pontees and a central cut crystal drop, Frank Hess, late 1940's.

Gilt metal brooch in the form of a spray set with tiny beads and round, flattened imitation pearls, Frank Hess, late 1950's

Bangle with glass beads, gilt metal motifs and oblong stones in cut glass, Frank Hess, 1940

Earring set with imitation seed pearls and multicolored glass beads, Frank Hess, 1950's

Below fake pearl necklace with glass paste leaves designed by Hess in the late 1930's.

Choker with multiple thin layers of pine-cones, glass paste spheres, boules and metal findings,  Frank Hess, 1941.
 

A complex threaded Baroque pearl necklace with oval cut crystals, yellow paste spheres, Frank Hess, 1957.