Description
Delicate and lacelike white jewelry like this fine necklace with its fixed pendant grew popular around 1900 and remained fashionable in the upper class up until around 1915. Apart from plain necklaces with pear-shaped pendants – so-called Lavallière, named after duchess Louise de la Vallière, longtime lover of French king Louis XIV. – negligee pendants gained popularity, which were more elaborately crafted and are characterized by two gemstones sitting at the end of unevenly long suspensions.
Jewelry of the time was embellished with rose cut diamonds and full cut diamonds – also called old mine cut diamonds – which were set in white metal in order to not distort their color. As the preferred material for setting diamonds around 1900 platinum won out over silver, which had previously been in use as the rigor material enabled almost invisible settings. The delicacy and brilliance of this piece also draws back to the utilization of platinum and the millegriffes even enhance this impression. A technique, that nowadays cannot be executed in the same quality and that shows the authenticity of the piece.
The center piece of the necklace is designed as a fan form or as a budding blossom and is decorated with diamonds. Delicate and unevenly long pendulums are strapped to the center that are embellished with rose cut diamonds and end in two full cut diamonds. The parallel suspensions, however, do not twist although they both remain independently moving elements. And in their movement, they sparkle glamorously!
