Pretty things...

This Bakelite bronzed brooch was picked up in a costume jewellery shop in Stockbridge, Edinburgh many years ago. It was said to be a 1930 French production and the design influenced by Edgar Brandt. His work, though on a much larger scale was copied in miniature by the Art-Deco artisans of the day.



Edgar Brandt was born in Paris on December 24, 1880. Trained in the Ecole Professionnelle de Vierzon, he set up an ironmongery in Paris. There he created gates, balustrades, floor lamps and chandeliers in bronze, hammered wrought iron and steel for grand houses and ocean liners. His style was typical for the period with cone-fires, branches, fruits, and even birds and human faces. After the WWI, he created the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier under the Paris Arc de Triomphe. He participated in the famous Exposition Internationale des Arts Decoratifs de 1925 in Paris, making the monumental gate of the exposition and participating in the Hotel du Collectionneur of Jacques-Emile Ruhlmann. He opened a gallery in New York and another one at the Boulevard Malesherbes in Paris. He created for embassies, hotels and liners. All the rich and famous wanted and paid for his works. He was awarded the title of Knight of the Legion of Honor, and received the Medal of Honor for Applied Art by the Societe des Artistes Francais In 1939, he moved to Switzerland and died in Geneva in 1960.