Be Jewelled by Tiffany, 1837-1987
Sunday, 2 November 2008
Since its foundation in 1837, Tiffany & Co. has been a uniquely American brand, famous for glamour, creative design, and fine craftsmanship. Starting modestly on Broadway, Tiffany rose quickly to international fame, its jewelry stunning the world at the great 19th-century international exhibitions. America’s new rich delighted in the striking jewels created by Tiffany designer Paulding Farnham and, from 1904, Louis Comfort Tiffany, who pioneered a distinctively American aesthetic.
A great period of naturalism in jewelry was followed by the abstract geometry of Art Deco. Ever at the forefront of design, Tiffany moved confidently into the 1930s and 1940s with large and glamorous colorful stones set in swirling gold. In the postwar 1950s, Tiffany boldly backed new designers, including the elegant and witty French designer Jean Schlumberger. In the 1970s Tiffany turned to the designers Elsa Peretti and Paloma Picasso, whose work captured the informality and fun that patrons now looked for in their jewelry.
This sumptuous book charts the entire history of Tiffany, from its founding to the 1980s. It presents full catalogue entries for some two hundred pieces of jewelry, all beautifully photographed.
Clare Phillips is curator in the Department of Sculpture, Metalwork, Ceramics and Glass at the Victoria and Albert Museum, London. Vivienne Becker is an independent jewelry historian and journalist. Ulysses Grant Dietz is curator of decorative arts, The Newark Museum. Alice Cooney Frelinghuysen is Anthony W. and Lulu C. Wang Curator of American Decorative Art, The Metropolitan Museum of Art. John Loring has been the design director at Tiffany since 1979. Katherine Purcell is a director of the London jewelry firm Wartski and a jewelry historian specializing in French nineteenth-century jewelry.
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