List of Costume Jewelry Designers and their Marks by Dr. Lori

hi it's dr laurie and i've got a list of costume jewelry designers and their marks for you now i'm going to do other videos about this too for others so this is not every single one but i've got a list for you and i'm going to continue these lists in other videos for you because i want you to be able to know the custom jewelry designers that you should be looking for thrift stores antique shops estate sales yard sales grandma's jewelry box i want you to be looking for these these particular makers and i want to show you their marks so the first one on the list is signer signer is a high-end costume jewelry designer that started in the 19 the late 1920s and it really came of age with starlets and celebrities and movie stars of the 1930s and 1940s signer pieces are bold costume jewelry pieces and a lot of times they have a two-tone effect or they have a textural effect that something is very textural and then something is very flat or very uh muted in its style the style is pretty straightforward and they're bold pieces though they're straightforward but they're bold signers known for in fact like this shiner pin from the 1960s known in fact for their ability to create faux stones right to basically make pieces look real when they are of course made of lesser quality or less expensive more affordable materials gold-plated or silver plated pieces in this particular place case gold-plated and you can see how the stones are really in very nice development of stones that are looking like turquoise but of course are not real turquoise so signer is introduced in the 1920s sold in boutiques in new york in the early years of the 20th century and continue to be on the list of costume jewelry designers and their marks at number one the next number two the second costume jewelry designer and its mark is eisenberg now you probably have all heard of eisenberg and seen eisenberg pieces maybe you're very familiar with them the thing about eisenberg is eisenberg first started out as a clothing manufacturer they made clothes first and then moved into jewelry costume jewelry in the latter part of the 1930s just before world war ii so various designs and their designs are oftentimes figural what does that mean well we think a figure when we think of animals or we think of flowers or we think of starbursts or we think of people when we think of figural designs these designs are in fact very very well detailed as they are designed and they're also used high-end austrian crystals and they'll use lovely rhinestones and there'll be a whole lot of sparkle on these pieces and they're easily and clearly marked eisenberg uses different marks various marks i should say but they use the eisenberg mark most commonly you also might see a mark that's eisenberg ice or eisenberg sterling when they use sterling silver as opposed to a base metal but for of course list number two designer number two on our list eisenberg these are really quite fine pieces and values are usually pretty high for eisenberg this next of course um custom jewelry designer on our list number three is kramer of new york kramer pieces are known for sets now you know i like sets i like sets of costume jewelry i like sets in general why because sets when you have a set you have a necklace a bracelet earrings a brooch or necklace earrings and a brooch you know that's going to increase value if you can sell the set or resell the set together what i like about kramer of course introduced during world war ii in 1943 kramer of new york very clearly identifies and marks their pieces the piece is usually on the cup or the setting cup on the on the reverse side of of course their pieces of costume jewelry and they were known for costume jewelry designs that simulated real diamonds simulating real stones was a big deal for creamer they even had a line of costume jewelry pieces called the diamond look they were a little bit more diminutive than maybe an eisenberg or a signer piece but in fact the diamond look pieces would have a little bit smaller and they really did fool you that they could look like the real thing so the diamond look pieces of course were costume jewelry and they were made of rhinestones and of course austrian crystals depending on the piece and other uh faux rubies faux emeralds faux of course sapphires and such but kramer number three on the list a really beautiful costume jewelry designs for of course the american public the next costume jewelry designer that i want to talk to you about number four which is my favorite number number four uh it started in the late 1920s into the 1930s miriam haskell now miriam haskell pieces are very well known most people will say oh i know miriam asked when i see a miriam haskell piece i know to pick it up at the thrift store but mary maskel didn't do a lot of her own designing she actually hired people great designers like frank hess to of course do the designs for her she was a good businesswoman is what she was her pieces are quite distinctive they usually have a three dimensionality to them a three-dimensional type of feel they would basically wire together the faux pearls very well known for faux pearls and of course wiring together the settings that would be manipulated to host these faux pieces handmade construction handmade construction is why miriam haskell pieces are in fact so desirable because they really are done in fact with the designer's hand right on them all the time the other thing that you're seeing is a very straightforward oval cartouche with the miriam haskell name mark you can't miss it it's very easy to find and as i said they're wired together for good construction and the simulated faux pearls and other materials that they use to suggest simulated pieces is extremely important so you'll see things like of course simulated gemstones you'll see different uh types of metals being utilized you'll see some pieces that are gold or silver plated miriam haskell really had a wide array of of course pieces that she introduced with this 3d quality that she had in a lot of her pieces the next costume jewelry designer number five of course is shriner and shriner is a wonderful company that makes some great pieces and has some innovations when it came to of course the construction of their pieces so one of the things they did was they inverted their stones they put their faux stones in but they would invert them and inverting them gave a very different look from some of their competition shriner pieces are clearly marked usually on the back of the setting and those wells they typically would layer elements on top elements so faux stones or faux gemstones on top one of one another that's one of the characteristics of shriner and then they often had these little pinched cups or wells that the stone would sit in that was also something that we saw of shriner and then they had what we sometimes call hound tooth or wolf tooth prong so prongs that are a little bit longer that add a little bit of style to their pieces as well uh brooches were very popular as were of course the bracelets and uh they utilized uh rhinestones and of course faceted pieces of glass that looked like gemstones as well and then of course number six on our list is trafari trefari you all know the name you know crowned trifari marks and you know of course other trefari marks but trafari was trying to mimic or imitate the big fine jewelry firms like van cleef and arpels tiffany of course some of the other ones like cartier and you'll see in fact their pieces are very very well respected and they sell very high now they have a very long tradition they start in 1910 as costume jewelry designers and they create everything from faux pearl necklaces to small floral earrings sometimes in silver plate sometimes in gold plate sometimes they're vermeel or gold washed you'll also see various metals being used you'll also see of course beautiful large brooches gemstones simulated as well but trafari is the name that lots of people look for because they look so closely like fine jewelry designs trefari's mark is very straightforward you'll see a crown trifari mark so the tea in trafari is a little crown on top of it you'll see that mark and it's easy to describe and recognize the seventh piece on our list is of course this designer originals by robert named for robert levy originals by robert was very well known for holiday pins so oftentimes you're going to see more faux emeralds and more faux rubies green and red on holiday pins by originals by robert established in the 1960s first called by other names but original by robert actually was this ornate gold beautiful kind of open work in their costume jewelry designs and you'll notice again that three-dimensionality that we saw with miriam haskell is actually followed by this designer originals by robert you're going to see that they kind of build atop one another by using these settings they usually use these settings that come up from the piece pretty straightforward in their designs so originals by rogers if you're looking for a holiday pin that's vintage you're probably looking for originals by robert and then we have florenza florenza of course is number is number eight on our list and florenza had this interest in victorian revival and renaissance revival designs that's right they looked back at victorian jewelry and even as far back as renaissance jewelry and they started to make their pieces in this design style a lot of these pieces are electroplated and you'll notice the florenza mark is very clearly found on the back of their brooches this particular broach is one which is really quite fine and very typical of what you would see on pieces that could have been worn by people like the mona lisa right in the in the early 1500s pieces that would be gold open work filigree and then they would have they would have faux of course seed pearls small pieces of coral some blue core some blue turquoise to of course show you different types of elements and this idea of looking back at historical jewelry was something that florenza did better than a lot of other costume jewelry designers their mark is easy to find and of course florenza pieces if you're wearing something by florenza you're wearing a statement piece that's for sure not pa is number nine on our list of custom jewelry designers and their marks not ba pieces are very easy to find they usually have that script nappy a mark on them you can find that on the clasps of most bracelets by nappier and not ba pieces would oftentimes have a two-tone sometimes they just have an individual links that were all gold in a modernist style but sometimes they'd have bracelets that they would produce that would be two-tone or two elements maybe they would be little links of gold or a little rope of gold and then they'd have small seed pearls around it with of course their characteristic mark on the clasp their earrings or their necklaces would also be of course pretty straightforward and they could be worn modern designs worn for every day this is the time when we're seeing women wearing costume jewelry for their everyday lives um the of course the not be a mark very straightforward and the not bad designs are good for throughout the day or of course if you're looking to put pieces into evening wear use too those are my that's my list of costume jewelry designers and their marks

Channel: Dr. Lori

Views: 101,722

Keywords: collectable (Industry), collectibles, dr. lori, Antique (Taxonomy Subject), Appraiser (Profession), Trifari, Ciner, Florenza

Id: Y_TnLHf1xow

Length: 12min 49sec (769 seconds)

Published: Sun Oct 02 2022