Featured Antique jewellery collectors: do you wear your collection?

Prong setting? Yes, those can wear and stones can become loose because of it, so it is good to check them regularly.

I am also a double necklace/chain person.

 

I wear jewelry everyday. Even if I'm not leaving home. I like the little glint when I catch myself in the mirror.

I have a small amount of antique gold jewelry and a larger cameo collection. I wear everything that can be worn (some unset or damaged frame cameos can't be) at various times. Brooches go on jackets, coats and sweaters with a rubber earring back.

I go out with my husband every weekend and wear a whole compliment of rings, necklaces, earrings and bracelets. We go downtown or to the woods. I never worry about crime and I don't worry about loss on smaller pieces that I know to be quite sturdy. I get all my pieces looked over by my jeweler. If I lose a stone, I know he can replace it for me. I've had him replace ones the were missing from before my purchase.

I save bigger flamboyant pieces and big, more delicate expensive cameos for when we go to lectures, gallery openings, events, or I know I'm spending the day doing something fairly calm.

I visited with some of my co-workers yesterday and another antique enthusiast was wearing a very large gold and many turquoise stone 19th c bracelet. She said she wears her antique jewelry often as well.

You should wear your jewelry and enjoy it. That's what it's for. For the pieces I'm not wearing, I keep my cameos in glass topped boxes so I can see them all, and my antique pieces in a jewelry box that displays everything when I open them.

 

I always grab a ring before I go outside, even if just for grocery shopping, cuz rings are super easy to put up! Necklaces and brooches are more for holiday time…

 

Rings and earrings in my case, wherever I go. Brooches and necklaces occasionally.
Bracelets only in summer, when I don't have to wear a coat and wrestle with the sleeve to try and fit my bracelet through it.

 

Forgot to add, I wear akar bahar (Indonesian black or white coral) cuffs or bangles when the arthitis in my hands plays up, it helps. I have a collection, some with silver mounts and one that is carved to look like a dragon, so I can pick one to suit my mood.

 

A friend and I go out for drinks about once a month and I often wear the pendant I mentioned HERE.

 

I wear bracelets almost daily in short-sleeve weather. Necklaces when I can. Earrings rarely. They usually would get worn to church, the only place I still actually dress up, but screwbacks don't play well with the earplugs I need to wear for the music.

 

I see why people all love bracelets/bangles, tho I have none in my collection… they can always be seen when worn, and more noticeable than rings

 

And they don't slide off when the weather gets colder.

 

At this phase of my collection, I don't have anything seriously valuable (antique + gold + diamonds ) I need to worry about wearing. I don't have many places to dress up for, but the most I've done is my gold chain and dormuses, which I think in my farm community doesn't merit a second glance as something 'nice'. I'd like to set up some shadow boxes with the pieces I like but aren't my style to wear, but otherwise I try to get them out when I can! I've pinned my snake brooch to my turtleneck like a cameo before, and I particularly like fastening brooches to chains to make them pendants. If they don't hang straight, I'll pin them to my shirt and make them a fixed pendant, which keeps them safer anyway. Most of my excursions are to car boot sales/vide greniers, so usually I'm only out for 3 or 4 hours. I've not lost or broken anything yet.

 

@mirana I wear my “good” jewelry, use my china, wear the 1 perfume I actually like, allow my grandchildren all over my house. I had a vintage bottle of wine that someone gave us, I forgot about it, my daughter in law opened it, my son had a fit & said they have had that since I was a kid, I told her pour me a glass so we will have it together & enjoy it. Why keep something that is meant to be enjoyed, used, worn or sat on for a special occasion. Everyday should be considered special we never know what tomorrow will bring.

 

Years ago I joked to a friend about women I saw at the ballet wearing rings on many fingers as if they were afraid they would die before they had the chance to wear them all. I'm starting to be that woman, although I let my ballet subscriptions lapse.

 

and then , of course........there's this.......

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That's exactly how I feel about it! Things are meant to be used or seen. I got that opinion after not being allowed in the "nice" living room on the "nice" furniture when I was a kid. My mother collecting 5 sets of china no one ever used.... She got better about it later, but still had the tendency to keep "special" items until it was too late to use them.

Now I use the nice dishes every day even when it's just us. Why don't we get to have a thrill from using the fun stuff! I'd rather make memories with it, rather than forget it in a box.

 

Looks like me headed to lunch ! I like a ring on every finger .

 

and the extra on the ring finger. A friend does that.

 

@mirana I think part of it is how my Grandparents were with us, we had an Aunt one of many, that anytime we went to her house we were banished to the playroom (basement) she had plastic on her furniture, on her dining room chairs, everything was covered with something. I dreaded her house & her, recently my cousin & I tried to count how many times she actually spoke to us, yup never. She was the only relative we had that was like that. I so agree things are meant to create memories (I love that) & enjoy & have fun with!

 

Plastic on the 'good' furniture that no one ever used was a Thing. I've never understood having a room and furniture that was too precious to use, but it was a Victorian leftover that overstayed its welcome.

 

My relatives in Miami were all about plastic slip covers. They didnt believe in air conditioning either,so youd leave pools of sweat when you sat on their furniture. Non demonstrative they were not,you always went home covered in lip stick kisses ! That I hated worse than the slipcovers !

 

LOL Johnny! As we are Jewish, you never left a gathering without shades of lipstick all over our faces & it was always the impossible to remove red. At my Grandmothers funeral, I spoke with red smattered all over my face & sunglasses, the poor Rabbi gave me his hankie so I could wipe it off. It stained his hankie I felt so bad for his good deed I replaced them.I had that one relative who luckily we were banished to downstairs.