50s costume jewellery, made in Australia
One of my earliest memories is of my mother’s dark green earrings. To this day, I love green jewellery- especially costume jewellery of a certain vintage.
This necklace and earrings are displayed on a Diana plate [may have mentioned Diana in a few posts, below…] I love botanical images and this wattle plate is a favourite; its colours and vintage accord well with the jewellery. All the jewellery features ‘pearlescence’ – fake pearl-i-ness [I’m not making this up!]- a particularly glamorous invention of the 50s. I especially love the clasp on the necklace – it looks like two earrings on either side of the clasp. Such attention to detail, even when often the clasp was not always seen under a ladies’ 50s bouffant.
The middle pair of [‘grape drop’, olive-green] earrings are screw-on, whilst the other two pairs are clip-ons. The green round earrings are similar in colour/tone to the necklace, although I purchased them separately and they are not a set. However, since every second bead is spherical, I think one could get away with wearing the necklace and the round earrings as an ensemble. The white pearlescence earrings round out a nice little set.
If you buy this set, you must totally send me a photo of you wearing/modelling it! For sale: $AUD80
re:retro 
Your collection continues to amaze and delight. The jewellery is particularly lovely. And such thoughtful styling using the wattle plate.
oh, shucks, thanks maxicatt! you’d look good in that jewellery!
LOVE, LOVE, LOVE!!!
laurie! thanks!
so many things to love… so little time. Go to my Facebook page and look at my new wrought iron garden chairs. (you know what I mean when I say the word “new” lol!) I’m attracted to that pretty blue. Loved the blue necklace the most. http://www.facebook.com/foreverboundart
looks great laurie…you guys sure get around!
Hey … Thank you for following my blog for The Antique Jewellery Shop. I thought I’d stop by and have a look at yours 🙂 This particular post is really lovely and well written too! I’m going to look through your other posts too … I hope to learn a little about Australian jewellery! We don’t find much of it over here in the UK. I did have a really beautiful Australian Silver brooch about a year back. It was soooo large and set with a beautiful painted porcelain plaque. It had lovely pea flowers on it if I remember rightly. The silver surround was actually marked Australian. Really rare (in the UK anyway) so find such marked pieces. I can’t recall the makers stamp right now. It dated to the 1930s or thereabouts.
As regards costume jewellery. A hell of a lot of it is extremely well made and I sometimes think it criminal how little appreciated it is by many people. Its amazing how little you can pick beautiful vintage costume pieces up for.
Please feel free to take a look around my vintage and antique jewellery website. I don’t sell costume jewellery but I do have a lot of beauitiful silver jewellery for sale. My web address is http://www.antiquejewelleryuk.co.uk.
Kindest regards
Cat Gothard
The Antique Jewellery Shop
yes cat- have already discovered your fantastic site! i guess i am more into kitschy glamour than vintage glamour…i mean i love the word pearlescence! and my whole blog is a testiment to my kitschy tastes. i have some more retro/50s costume jewellery to post…and now i look at it again- the colour green features prominently.