Couture 1950s WestGermany DiorDesigner Crystal DoubleTrimmed EmeraldCut Earrings
About the Item
- Creator:Christian Dior Haute Couture
- Metal:
- Stone:
- Stone Cut:
- Dimensions:Width: 1 in (25.4 mm)Depth: 1 in (25.4 mm)Length: 1.25 in (31.75 mm)
- Sold As:Set of 2
- Style:
- Place of Origin:
- Period:
- Date of Manufacture:1950s-1960s
- Condition:Wear consistent with age and use.
- Seller Location:Chicago, IL
- Reference Number:1stDibs: LU3244219101392
Christian Dior Haute Couture
When Christian Dior launched his haute couture house, in 1946, he wanted nothing less than to make “an elegant woman more beautiful and a beautiful woman more elegant.” He succeeded, and in doing so the visionary designer altered the landscape of 20th century fashion. Vintage Dior bags, shoes, evening dresses, shirts and other garments and accessories are known today for their feminine and sophisticated sensibility.
Dior was born in Granville, on the Normandy coast, in 1905. His prosperous haute bourgeois parents wanted him to become a diplomat despite his interest in art and architecture. However, they agreed to bankroll an art gallery, which Dior opened in 1928 in Paris with a friend.
This was the start of Dior’s rise in the city’s creative milieu, where he befriended Pablo Picasso and Jean Cocteau. After seven years as an art dealer, Dior retrained as a fashion illustrator, eventually landing a job as a fashion designer for Robert Piguet, and in 1941, following a year of military service, he joined the house of Lucien Lelong. Just five years later, with the backing of industrialist Marcel Boussac, the ascendant Dior established his own fashion house, at 30 avenue Montaigne in Paris.
Two years after the end of World War II, the fashion crowd and the moribund haute couture industry were yearning, comme tout Paris, for security and prosperity, desperate to discard the drab, sexless, utilitarian garb imposed by wartime deprivation. They needed to dream anew.
And Dior delivered: He designed a collection for a bright, optimistic future.
“It’s quite a revolution, dear Christian!” exclaimed Carmel Snow, the prescient American editor-in-chief of Harper’s Bazaar, famously proclaiming, “Your dresses have such a new look.” The press ran with the description, christening Dior’s debut Spring/Summer haute couture collection the New Look. “God help those who bought before they saw Dior,” said Snow. “This changes everything.”
Dior’s collection definitively declared that opulence, luxury and femininity were in. His skirts could have 40-meter-circumference hems, and outfits could weigh up to 60 pounds. They were cut and shaped like architecture, on strong foundations that molded women and “freed them from nature,” Dior said. Rather than rationing, his ladies wanted reams of fabric and 19-inch waists enforced by wire corsets, and the fashion world concurred. The debut got a standing ovation.
In the subsequent decade, Paris ruled as the undisputed fashion capital of the world, and Christian Dior reigned as its king. With the luxuriously full skirts of his New Look, suits and his drop-dead gorgeous couture evening dresses and ball gowns worthy of any princess, Dior gave women the gift of glamour they’d lost in the miserable years of war.
Find vintage Dior haute couture dresses and gowns for sale on 1stDibs.
- ShippingRetrieving quote...Ships From: North Adams, MA
- Return PolicyA return for this item may be initiated within 1 day of delivery.
- Couture Early Chanel Marked MadeInFrance WiredPearl&LampworkGlass ClipEarringsBy ChanelLocated in Chicago, ILStamped "Made In France" on their antique brass back-plates like the initial unbranded couture costume-jewelry commissioned by French Gabrielle "Coco" Chanel beginning in 1924, these floral-motif wired earrings with early handcrafted brass clips are decorated with button-like cultured mother-of-pearls mixed with Parisian organically-coated lampwork glass, which we photographed in indoor sunlight for the most accurate colors. The pair were designed by Chanel to accessorize a one-of-a-kind clothing ensemble (likely including cultured-pearl buttons and a brooch) for a client of this pearl-associated couturier whose earliest one-of-a-kind jewelry--unlike other 1920s fashion designers--sometimes mixed real and faux gems. The intricate glass artistry, wired clustered arrangement and earring findings are characteristic of one of Chanel's first Parisian paruriers, Louis Rousselet, who was a lampwork master with a workshop since 1920 specializing in faux-pearl glass beads and wire-work construction. As the three-piece flat-brass lever clips without hinge-holes on both sides predate Rousselet's wire-horseshoe clips, they can be dated like the patinated well-worn brass hardware to the mid-1920s. The beads of various sizes and ecru colors that are wired to each earring include five round graduating iridescent mother-of-pearl disks, along with lampwork glass replicating nine baroque pearls, five round pearls and two seed pearls. There are natural imperfections on the green-and-rose-reflecting cultured pearls, while there is some nacre-enamel loss on the glass beads that is not eye visible. On closer view, one of the central round glass beads has a lighter blister, which appears like the texture of some uncultured pearls. Of note, Chanel did not include a brand signature on any of her couture costume jewelry prior to the mid-1950s. As many of her clients who came to Paris for their couture-clothing fittings were foreign, the coordinated unique jewelry that was expected to leave the country was merely stamped "Made In France" or "France". We acquired these earrings in The States along with a similar set with less but larger "petals, berries and leaves", which we priced the same in a different listing despite the slightly greater size and weight of this pair. So we know that they both were created for a single commission of multiple unique earrings with like lampwork-glass shapes and findings to be paired with the ecru mother-of-pearls provided by Chanel. While we have acquired over a dozen pre-signature pieces commissioned by the founder, these are the earliest earrings that we have discovered by Chanel. We have never found a single match to contradict our recognition of her early couture creations nor to attribute them to another designer. Further, Art Deco couture...Category
Vintage 1920s French Artisan Clip-on Earrings
MaterialsPearl, Cultured Pearl, Brass
- Vendome GiltLeavesBranch GoldFilagree Handwired BlackGlass Crystals ClipEarringsBy VendomeLocated in Chicago, ILThese post-WWII high-end Vendome hand-wired clip earrings each feature a spray of yellow-gold gilt-metal leaves with a stylized branch and five prong-set clear crystals among a clust...Category
Vintage 1940s American Modern Clip-on Earrings
MaterialsCrystal, Gilt Metal, Yellow Gold
- Couture Chanel Pre1955 Signed France Gripoix PouredGlass Goosens EarringsBy Maison Gripoix for ChanelLocated in Chicago, ILThis couture pair of gold-gilt earrings are both stamped "France" on their convex gold-gilt metal ear-pads, which is characteristic of one-of-a-kind designs commissioned by Parisian ...Category
Mid-20th Century French Art Deco Clip-on Earrings
MaterialsCrystal, Turquoise, Pearl, Gold, Gilt Metal
- MiriamHaskell WWII FrankHess Rose Rhodoid & CrystalMontee Layered Clip ClimbersBy Frank Hess for Miriam HaskellLocated in Chicago, ILBeginning in 1939, American Miriam Haskell asked her first designer since 1926 Frank Hess to sparingly use metal in their costume-jewelry collections during WWII while war materials were needed. So not unlike the Spring/Summer 2024 floral appliques designed by Balmain artistic director Olivier Rousteing, hand-crafted rose-motif plastic never looked more beautiful in the 20th Century than such eye-catching glossy creations as these ballet-pink clip earrings by Hess. In this reflective and sparkling pair of lightweight slightly asymmetrical climbers, shiny film-like rhodoid is hand-cut, layered in three dimensions for irregular shadows, and riveted with clear roses-montees to a thin silver metal frame, which replaced Hess' characteristic wired Russian-gilt brass frame while still resembling his earlier construction (see our other Haskell listing for an early double fur-clip chain lariat). The earring clips, with tiny holes that were used for unsigned Haskell...Category
Vintage 1940s American Modern Clip-on Earrings
MaterialsCrystal, Mixed Metal
- HenrySchreiner EarlySet ProngSetCrystal Silver Spray Tiered Earrings & BroochBy Henry SchreinerLocated in Chicago, ILHenry Schreiner, the Austrian-born blacksmith founder of Schreiner in New York in 1932, handcrafted this demi-parure of prong-set clear crystal stylized-foliage sprays after he began...Category
Vintage 1940s American Victorian Brooches
MaterialsCrystal, Diamond, Rhodium, Silver
- CatEyeMoonstones Antique PinkTranslucentBallCut 14MM SterlingLeverClip EarringsLocated in Chicago, ILRare wide cat's-eye, translucent, blue-tone strong pink, near spherical, 14mm moonstones with misty lavender-white schiller are showcased on these antique sterling-silver hinged-clip lever earrings from the early 20th Century. They could be mistaken for exceptional Quahog pearls...Category
Antique Early 1900s Art Nouveau Clip-on Earrings
MaterialsMoonstone, Cat’s Eye, Sterling Silver
- Morganite Rose Gold Contemporary Clip-On Earrings with DiamondsBy Polya Medvedeva JewelleryLocated in Berlin, DEThese contemporary Peony Petal spring floral clip-on earrings are in 18 karat rose gold with 62 round natural diamonds, VS, F-G, and morganites octagon cut, 4,5 carats in total. The ...Category
21st Century and Contemporary German Contemporary Clip-on Earrings
MaterialsWhite Diamond, Morganite, Diamond, Beryl, Yellow Gold, White Gold, Rose ...
- PANIM 2.87 Carat Diamond Rosecut 18K White Gold Floral EarringsBy PANIMLocated in Tsim Sha Tsui, Hong KongPANIM 2.87 Carat Diamond Rosecut 18K White Gold Floral EarringsCategory
21st Century and Contemporary Indian Modern Clip-on Earrings
MaterialsDiamond, White Diamond, 18k Gold, White Gold
- Blue Sapphire with Diamond Earrings set in 18K White Gold SettingsLocated in Bangkok, THBlue Sapphire 5.18 carats with Diamond 2.66 carats Earrings set in 18K White Gold Settings Width: 1.5 cm Length: 2.3 cm Total Weight: 8.64 grams "We first opened doors in 1980 whe...Category
2010s Thai Contemporary Clip-on Earrings
MaterialsDiamond, Blue Sapphire, 18k Gold, White Gold
- Pendientes Oro blanco- rosa con DiamantesLocated in BARCELONA, ESPendientes de mujer bicolor Hoja 90 diamantes con peso total de 0,69 cts. Cierre omega Oro rosa y oro blanco 18 kt. 9,30 gramos. Producto nuevo a estrenar Ref: N102864LFCategory
21st Century and Contemporary European Clip-on Earrings
- Pendientes en Oro, Diamantes y PerlaLocated in BARCELONA, ESPendientes en Oro Blanco para mujer 28x Diamantes en talla Brillante con peso total aprox. 0,42ct en calidad G/VS y 2x Perlas naturales cultivadas de 11mm cada una Cierre presión ...Category
21st Century and Contemporary European Clip-on Earrings
- Signed Trifari Vintage Rhinestone Set of Floral Clip on Earrings & PinBy TrifariLocated in Jacksonville, FLEmbrace the timeless elegance of Trifari craftsmanship with our exquisite Vintage Rhinestone Floral Pin and Earrings Set. This captivating ensemble exudes sophistication and grace, showcasing the renowned artistry that Trifari is celebrated for. The centerpiece of the set is the Rhinestone Floral Pin, measuring 2.25 inches in length. The pin features a stunning arrangement of rhinestone-encrusted flowers, meticulously crafted to create a dazzling display of brilliance. The intricate design and sparkling rhinestones add an enchanting allure to this vintage treasure. Complementing the pin are the matching Rhinestone Floral Earrings, measuring 1.13 inches in length. These earrings showcase the same captivating design as the pin, with rhinestone-encrusted flowers that elegantly dangle from hypoallergenic hooks. The earrings beautifully frame your face and provide a touch of glamour to any ensemble. Crafted with attention to detail and using high-quality materials, this Vintage Trifari Rhinestone Floral Pin and Earrings Set exudes a sense of refined luxury, perfect for special occasions or to add a touch of sophistication to your everyday attire. Indulge in the nostalgia of vintage aesthetics and elevate your style with this timeless Trifari set...Category
20th Century American Art Deco Clip-on Earrings