Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1913-11-29

bracelet for each arm, we had perfect
deluge of the blue enamel, which stood
for the regeneration of artistic taste
ON the whole and in spite of the abb
| surdities of art nouveau," with its mo
notonous designs. blue enamel has done
a good deal towards giving jewelry other
| qualities than mere expensiveness. AT
| least it has emphasized taste, if only by
/ promoting abstention. Really beautiful
iewelry is at once very much more en-
pensive and very much cheaper than
formerly. That is to say, very much
more attention is paid now to beauty OF
setting, and at the same time great
many cheaper and yet beautiful mate
rails have come into vogue.
Now that ii is no longer a sign OF
worth to wear a given quantity OF jew
els. and to exhibit them at regular inter-
walls, such jewels as are worn are de-
pendent. not only on the taste with
which they are wrought, but also upon
the circumstances under which they are
worm No ono today, for instance, would
wear much jewelry beyond a gold safety
pin when engaged in any form of sport;
the early bicyelists, on the other hand.
saw no necessity to curtail their jewelry.
The Victorians would have Thought it
almost indecent not to dissemble with a
necklace what they so lavishly exposed.
Today the majority of women wear no
necklace at all; bracelets have almost
Disappeared rings are no longer allowed
to accumulate until they reach the
knuckle, and each ring is designed to
stand upon it's own merits, and generally
also with view to enhancing an effect
of costume.
English women still wear on ordinary
occasions more jewelry than do the
women of France or Germany. But
even in England jewelry has become
less an object in itself than something
fine and rare with which to point the
moral of eyes, hair. costume. For this
reason earrings have again come into
fashion Their proximity to the face and
their little incessant scintillation make
them q very Characteristic form of
adornment. \ woman can altar her
whole personality by changing from a
couple of small pearl earrings to one
immense gold ring worn on the side of
the head ON which the hat is not pressed
down. She can enhance an eye of doubt
full blue until it resembles the gentian
merely by the wearing of the dapis drop
Cats eyes, worn by brown woman are
singularly expressive, and everybody
knows that the really wicked woman al
ways has red hair, with green earrings
to make it redder
| The fashion of clinging stuffs has also
provided many opportunities for jewels.
Buckles, clasps, breastplates. chains all
give point to fragile stuffs which might
otherwise look insipid. Also, the fact
that gold has yielded to silver and piati-
mum allows very much more to be made
of eolored stones. The effect of lapis
jade, or coral among the dense stones Of
amethysts aquamarines. tourmalines as
color-points to a dress is exquisite III a
gold setting. Beautiful enamel has also
come into it's own again, and can be used
very effectively as a dress adjunct in the
form of clasps, pendants. hair ornaments
! and even rings.
Thus the discretion of present-day
l jewelry is its greatest virtue its sec.
ond. perhaps. that while it is still posi-.
Bile to pend fortunes on pearl necklaces
expensiyeness need not necessarily be The
{ first impression given by a jewel. Or
the contrary, it is the tendency for The
effect of the jewel to be seen rather
than the jewel itself. 1t need not be no.
: teed, but it must be Observation-Disclosures
\ ter Guardian.