Modern Jewellery design

Classics and exponents of modern designer jewellery

Jewellery tends to be regarded either as conventional luxury goods or as mass-produced fashion ware. In the German-speaking countries especially, however, a form of jewellery design developed in the 20th century that is closely linked to developments in fine art, architecture, and design. Modern designer jewellery is rooted in the arts and crafts renewal movements of the early 20th century. Hence Jugendstil/Art Nouveau and Art Déco produced goldsmiths and artisans who were fiercely committed to modern design. After the Second World War, those ideas were further developed at European crafts schools and art academies.

Scandinavia and later Germany as well saw the emergence between the 1960s and 1980s of the first modern jewellery collections designed by artists and jewellery designers for jewellery manufacturers. Since the 1980s, more and more graduates of vocational crafts schools and jewellery academies have been establishing jewellery studios and launching modern jewellery collections. Thus a renewal of jewellery culture that has virtually escaped the notice of the public at large has taken place in Germany on a scale unprecedented worldwide. Since the 1990s, German designer jewellery has also been increasingly acclaimed in the US, Spain, the Netherlands, Luxemburg and many Asian countries.

Modern Jewellery Design – Past and Present by Reinhold Ludwig, a new publication from ARNOLDSCHE Art Publishers, represents the first survey of modern manufactured designer jewellery from the post-war years to the present. Divided into three sections, the book provides a retrospective view of the origins of modern jewellery, followed by a large illustrated section, which traces its development by showcasing the most important classics of modern designer jewellery and today’s leading exponents with their extraordinary designs. The third section of the publication is devoted to some sixty portraits of the most important jewellery manufacturers and designers – and, therefore, presents a major chapter of Scandinavian and German jewellery history from the 1960s to the present day.

In sumptuous photographs accompanied by a wealth of expert information, the former general editor of Schmuck Magazin, a well-known journal in the field, documents the development of modern manufactured designer jewellery from the post-war era to the present. A standard work on the history of modern designer jewellery!