Price Guide
My Favorite Three Picks for Best Antique and Vintage Jewelry Price Guides and Authors
I have been collecting antique and vintage costume and fine jewelry for more than three decades. Most of what I bought was the Saturday and Sunday flea markets on the local drive-in theater once a month and a huge outdoor antique market held in the mountains neighborhood where I grew up. I never really paid a quarter a dime here and there but sometimes a few dollars over the years until I really became a serious collector, I'd probably not more than $ 500.00 in an amazing collection of over 2500-3000 pieces.
Over the years I have collected many types of jewelry. Initially, bracelets, rings and then when I left the university and pursued my career as an interior designer, I found pins and earrings to practical and appropriate. In the mid-60's until early 1970 I bought a lot of colorful and heavy "plastic" pieces and most were bracelets. I just made them dull clunk when she was hit at my desk … and I'm sure you know where this is going … you're right, most were Bakelite. One in particular is a beautiful art deco black, red, orange, yellow and green bracelet and clip fins it's like a carnival on your arm. It fits great and feels sturdy andit brings me joy. It was not until I received Harrice Simon-Miller 2002 / 3 edition Official Price Guide to costume jewelry, that I realized the bracelet is called "Philadelphia" and has a market value of $ 5,000 for making the Holy Grail of Bakelite jewelry.
I was also very passionate for the charm bracelets made in the year 1960 by Napier. At one point I had over 30 of them and I rarely wore them I just loved holding them. I had colored fruit, the Asian theme, and my favorites were the marine theme with seashells and seahorses. More the years I paid between $ 1.00 – $ 5.00 per piece them and in early 2000, I sold them individually on eBay for $ 125.00 and up to 245.00 each. What a great performance right. Well yes but one day does not go by that sorry I sell them. They gave me more happiness than the money they spent.
As I became more sophisticated in my jewelry search I began to love all things Miriam Haskell, Eisenberg, Pennino and Boucher. All these names seemed to come with a higher price but still affordable and all very luxurious. Then came starets, McClelland-Barclay, Schreiner, Dujay, DeMario, Reja, Deja and Alfred Philippe and Alfred Spaney the extra special pieces made for Crown Trifari. Needless to say I was beaten and could never be turned back. After a while and when I got older, I started the beauty of 19C Victorian and Art Nouveau and in particular the mourning pieces during and after the Civil War to understand. The Art Deco period pieces also caught my attention because their architectural design corner. Good enough for me …
Over the years it was really guessing on what I should pay for a piece and then the harder part came when trying to find out how a piece was worth. As a result I found that the public library had many jewelry price guides and I poured through them all for days on end and would sort out my next piece, I was obsessed for. Through this research, I found three authors who stood out as the best in giving the correct information for just about everything you should know as an antique and vintage costume and fine jewelry collector or dealer.
The first is Jean Adrienne Bell. Jean Adrienne Bell's Antiques Roadshow as a jewelry appraiser and is one of the leading authorities America's on antique jewelry. She has written many books and the first book I bought from her was "How to be a Jewelry Detective". This book is filled to the brim with invaluable information about the clues to solve mysteries jewelry. She gives easy tips for testing materials, gem cuts, hardware and the findings understanding across the centuries, and many more brands. I have recommended this book to literally 100's of my eBay buyers who may not be sure what is gutta-percha, or is it ivory or bone and what is a Briolette cut stone. She answers them all and she even has a small pocket field guide to take to the shops and flea markets.
My favorite book is its collection of Victorian jewelry that is a real treat for the eyes and is beautiful enough to be left for others to read. In this book she shows a surprising incredible selection of museum quality pieces of Costume and fine jewelry. Every piece is a work of art and each has an easy to understand description and assigned value. She provides history associated with the Victorian era and all of the protagonists were. She illuminates the reader about this period in time that was all about romance, passion and grief. Very good read and an excellent aid to the serious collector period piece.
My next favorite author is Harrice Simon-Miller. I have two of its price guides, Costume Jewelry Official Price Guide 2nd Edition and 3rd Edition on Costume Jewelry. What I like about her books is that she knows her stuff when it comes to costume jewelry dates from the early Art Deco to the present. Her books are very good for identifying the major players in the costume and fashion design industry. She really explains what every jewelry designer's signature look is and her photos and descriptions will give you an edge when you are in the field. Her values are truly representative of the retail in fine antique and jewelry shops parameters and give the reader some attention to your jewelry collection "fix" to get. She bought mine on eBay on a few occasions and each piece had always bought a strange and unexpected, so I think she knew or was creating a trend that others were unaware.
My third favorite author Roseann Ettinger. She has a series of price guides that are not only jewelry, but other vintage collectibles with much focus on fashion and the fifties. Her jewelry price guides under its "popular" series consisting of "Forties and Fifties Popular Jewelry", "Popular Jewelry of the 60's, 70's and 80's" and my all time favorite its "Popular Jewelry 1840-1940" the third revised edition. Its price guide covers jewelry pieces that you might actually encounter and can themselves for not much money. In Unlike Bell and Simon-Miller, museum display quality and hard to find documents, the documents mentioned in Ettinger are really feasible and I've actually had a lot of her pieces that she has described. Her photos are quite large making it easy to see the details of the pieces to see and do not address the glitzier side of jewelry, but real down to earth things that most of our mothers and grandmothers would have worn.
There are many great costume jewelry price guides out there of Nancy Schiffer, Lillian Baker, Christie Romero's Warman for, Cheri Simonds, Ronna Lee Atkins and many more, but my first three, the beginner or well seasoned antique and vintage costume and fine jewelry collector or dealer a well-rounded wealth of knowledge and pricing guidelines.
For more great tips and great jewelry jewelry to buy, visit Vintage Gems Emporium on www.vintagegemsemporium.com . Registration is free and easy.
About author: My name is Candace Daugherty and I live near Charleston, South Carolina. I am an entrepreneur and have worked as a retail design and marketing consultant with many internationally known retailers and fashion designers in the past 30 years. My true passion is antique and vintage costume and fine jewelry. I have collected ornaments for over 35 years and own many incredibly fabulous book pieces as shown in the many jewelry price guides discussed above.
Since October 1, 2008, I along with three others founded the first of its kind, an exclusive auction boutique for antique, vintage and new costume and fine jewelry. We started Vintagel Gems Emporium on www.vintagegemsemporium.com with three philosophies in mind. The first is a specialty boutique in an auction location only for the collector and specialist of antique and vintage costume and fine jewelry. The second for the lowest cost or fixed price auction site on the Internet. And the third is to the entire Virtual Gems Emporium Community first with an incredible service and fair equal treatment of all trading partners.
About the Author
My name is Candace Daugherty and I live near Charleston, South Carolina. Since Mid September -October 2008 I along with three others have founded the first of its kind, an exclusive auction boutique for antique, vintage and new costume and fine jewelry. We started Vintage Gems Emporium at www.vintagegemsemporium.com with three concepts in mind. One, a special boutique environment in an Auction Venue just for the collector and specialist of antique and vintage costume and fine jewelry. Two, to be the lowest cost auction or fixed price venue on the internet. And three to put the entire Vintage Gems Emporium community first with unbelievable customer service and fair equal treatment of all trading partners.
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RarityGuide.com the most accurate http://www.rarityguide.com/wowminis_view.php
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