Jewellery

Matthew Adams is moving into bling – well, vintage and antique jewellery from the Georgian period onwards.

Main stage at the design auction at Dorotheum in Vienna on May 30 is taken by jewellery designed by Josef Hoffmann, one of the leading lights of the Wiener Werkstätte.

A selection of glittering items on offer in English auctions.

Characterised by high-quality craftsmanship, a bold use of colour plus a love of whimsy, the menagerie of gem-set or enamel animal designs are particularly recognisable as signature Kutchinsky pieces.

Unlike other European jewellers, where designers and makers were often shrouded in anonymity, the Georg Jensen Co promoted its craftspeople and encouraged them to become names in their own right.

An old photo of a former owner and a memorial inscription will seldom add commercial value to a Victorian locket. However, the example by the Phillips Brothers of Cockspur Street offered by Mallams (20% buyer’s premium) in Oxford on March 21 carried the inscription 'Julia Hay Norman, Died 3rd October 1873'.

Creative flair combined with a maverick approach to metalwork set Louis Osman (1914-96) apart from other British designers of the post-war era.

“They were as bold, diverse, and brave as René Lalique and his peers had been in the 1900s, bucking convention and tradition to change the landscape of British jewellery.”

The December 6 jewellery sale at Roseberys (23% buyer’s premium) was the maiden auction for new head of department Mark Bowis.

Deemed a little ostentatious in some Western circles, tiaras remain popular with the so-called ‘new’ markets.

The closing nine lots in Lawrences’ January 18 sale were consigned by a lady in Somerset. They had belonged to her mother and grandmother and had been kept in a safe deposit box in the bank for about the last 30 years.