Wedding Headdress
Date: late 19th century
Culture: Russian
Medium: paper, metal, mother-of-pearl, glass, silk, cotton
Headdresses, or kokoshniks had the greatest abundance of ornamentation of any type of garment in Russia. They were most often made of damask woven with gilt metallic threads or velvet with gold embroidery. The wealthy peasant class often decorated their kokoshniks with pearls and gemstones. Their decorative elements were representative of the regions in which they were made. Those from the North were embellished with the river pearls that were plentiful in that area while goose down and woolen embroideries were more popular in the South. The headdresses worn by maidens exposed their hair, considered a prize possession in Russian culture.
Source: http://www.metmuseum.org
[Miniature Wedding Album of General Tom Thumb and Lavinia Warren]
Mathew B. Brady (American, Warren County, New York 1823–1896 New York City)
Date: ca. 1863
Medium: Albumen silver print
Wedding Fan
Date: 1887
Culture: American or European
Medium: ostrich feathers, pearl
Queen Elizabeth I
- Object:
Watercolour
- Place of origin:
England, Great Britain (made)
- Date:
ca. 1595-ca.1600 (painted)
- Artist/Maker:
Hilliard, Nicholas, born 1542 - died 1619 (artist)
- Materials and Techniques:
Watercolour on vellum
n the 1580s the political and religious temperature of Europe rose. Threats to the Queen’s safety increased, especially from Spain, and the fashion for wearing the Queen’s image to express loyalty and devotion became established. From the late 1580s there was a proliferation of portraits of the Queen.
Portrait of Mary Stuart, Queen of Scots
- Object:
Painting
- Place of origin:
England, Great Britain (possibly, made)
- Date:
17th century
- Artist/Maker:
Francois Clouet, born 1511 - died 1572 (After, painter (artist))
- Materials and Techniques:
oil on oak panel
Queen Victoria
- Object:
Brooch
- Place of origin:
France (made)
- Date:
1851 (made)
- Artist/Maker:
Lebas, Paul (cameo, carvers)
Dafrique, Félix (maker) - Materials and Techniques:
Shell cameo, mounted with gold, and set with emeralds and diamonds
This brooch shows the young Queen Victoria. The design is based on a portrait of her in Garter Robes by Thomas Sully painted 1838. The image on the brooch is in reverse from the portrait and it probably follows a lithograph by Henri Grevedon published in Paris in 1839 which is also in reverse. We think that the French jeweller Félix Dafrique showed this brooch at the Great Exhibition of 1851 in London. There he received a Prize Medal for his ‘polychromic cameos’. Dafrique played a leading role in reviving the Renaissance fashion for commessi brooches. A commesso is a type of cameo further decorated with enamelled gold and jewels.
Mitre
- Place of origin:
Armenia (made)
- Date:
1650-1750 (made)
19th century (altered) - Artist/Maker:
Unknown (production)
- Materials and Techniques:
Silver-gilt
Crown
- Place of origin:
Spain (made)
- Date:
ca. 1600 (made)
- Artist/Maker:
Unknown (production)
- Materials and Techniques:
Copper-gilt, pierced, set with enamelled silver bosses, enamelled gold rosettes and glass pastes
The crown is made in a style unique to Spanish goldsmiths’ work of the period 1580-1610, a style inspired by the restrained architecture of Juan Herrera, who had worked on the Escorial Palace near Madrid for Philip II from about 1570. Metalwork of the period echoed his clean architectural lines, but craftsmen added enamel bosses and coloured pastes or gems for decoration.
Crown
- Place of origin:
Fribourg, Switzerland (made)
- Date:
1566 (made)
- Artist/Maker:
Schmaltz, Hans (maker)
- Materials and Techniques:
Gilt-copper, twisted, embossed and engraved; rock crystal, imitation pearls and foiled glass pastes
Jewelled and enamelled crowns are often found on the heads of statues of the Virgin Mary in Catholic churches.
