Mastery of Design: The Fuchsias and Ferns Hair Ornament, 1820

The Victoria & Albert Museum

The upswept, ornate hairstyles of the 1820s lent themselves to being adorned with shimmering hair ornaments such as this gold-backed floral spray of European-cut diamonds set in silver.

At the time, the trend in jewelry was to replicate the beauty of nature. Bodice ornaments, brooches, hair ornaments, earrings, necklaces, rings, and bracelets all took the form of shining floral arrangements, baskets of fruit and other natural themes.

This ornament comes from Western Europe, about 1820, and depicts fuchsias and ferns in the universal language of nature. Naturalistic jewelry such as this arose during the Romantic movement along with a new interest in a revived Rococo style. From the early 1820s until about 1830, these designs were stylized and delicate like the one we see here. Later, jewelers strove to be ever-more precise with their copies of flowers, leaves, fruit and insects and the pieces became heavier and more colorful, often employing enamel and complicated gold mounts.