Ancient Beginnings
A large number of centuries ago, boxes adorned with jewels and valuable metals were utilised to store critical documents and treasured pieces of jewelry. Storage choices for documents and trinkets were couple of, so the casket-a container smaller than a chest, but bigger than a straight forward box-was utilized. Some boxes were adorned with metals, other people with embossed leather or carved wood. Others had been encrusted with jewels or elaborately carved ivory. Only the quite wealthy used caskets and jewelry boxes considering no one other than the wealthy could afford to commission skilled craftsmen to generate such items. The lower classes would not use such frivolous techniques of storage.
Some jewelry boxes had been incredibly big and ornate, much like the ones utilised by Marie Antoinette, whose jewelry armoires are on display now in both France and England.
Trends in Trinket Boxes
In the Victorian era, little boxes for holding trinkets or a few rings had been en vogue. Several of these were made of porcelain, and typically, they would showcase images of youngsters, animals, and flowers on the lids. It was widespread to have various trinket boxes on shelves and tabletops in the course of this era.
Early caskets in America showcased images of pre-Civil War plantation life. Others depicted interest in other cultures such as those of Egypt, Greece, or Rome.
In the early 1900s, metal jewelry boxes were all the rage thanks to the Art Nouveau movement. The caskets had been cast in metal and completed in copper, gold, or silver. The outsides of these boxes depicted flowers, birds, and ladies with lengthy hair. Some had a single flower motif on the outside as a nod to the Victorian trend of sending a message with flowers, and every flower representing its own which means. Roses would symbolize love, for example.
At present, jewelry boxes are made of wood, carved stone, or cast metal. They may perhaps sit on a dresser or bureau or stand alone in the case of the jewelry armoire, which resembles a little cabinet on legs.
Contemporary Availability
Following the Industrial Revolution, jewelry boxes were on the market thanks to mass production, and firms such as Marshall Fields, Sears and Roebuck, and Montgomery Ward, brought them to the persons via mail order catalogs.
Currently, almost all females and some males, have some type of jewelry or trinket box for storing every thing from rings and loose modify to watches and brooches. Even kids appreciate jewelry boxes, which includes boxes that also play music.
