This week’s book competition prize is Designers & Jewellery 1850–1940: Jewellery and Metalwork from the Fitzwilliam Museum by Helen Ritchie (Philip Wilson Publishers). Click here for your chance to win.
The Fitzwilliam Museum holds stunning examples of jewellery and metalwork from the late 19th and early 20th centuries. This exceptional period of design covers the neo-Gothic and historicist designs of the 1850s and 1860s, the ground-breaking work of British Arts & Crafts designers, the sinuous curves influenced by the European Art Nouveau movement and the structural modernity of the 1930s.
The mid-late 19th-century fashion for historicism is represented by some of the finest jewellers of the time including Alessandro Castellani, the Giuliano family and John Brogden, as well as a spectacular decanter by William Burges. There are important pieces of jewellery and silver by the most famous of Arts & Crafts designers, including C.R. Ashbee, Henry Wilson, Gilbert Marks and John Paul Cooper, as well as unique jewellery designed by the artist Charles Ricketts. Modernist silver is well-represented by Omar Ramsden and Harry G. Murphy.
This beautifully illustrated volume reproduces over 50 of the Museum’s most important pieces from this period, many previously unpublished, with comparative illustrations of the original designs.The book is arranged chronologically by designer with biographies, a description of their work and how it changed over time, as well as commentary about the specific works in the Museum’s collection.
Answer the following question, by 10 p.m. on 7 September, to win a copy of Designers & Jewellery 1850–1940: Jewellery and Metalwork from the Fitzwilliam Museum by Helen Ritchie (Philip Wilson Publishers).
Q: Which architect and designer founded the Guild of Handicraft?
For our last competition we offered a copy of Michaelina Wautier, 1614–1689: Glorifying a Forgotten Talent by Katlijne Van der Stighelen (Rubenshuis/BAI).
Q: In which museum can you find Michaelina Wautier’s monumental Triumph of Bacchus?
Answer: Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna
Congratulations to the winner, Elaine Patterson