Gifts for the Home
• January 11, 2016

Gift ideas for the kitchen, the office and every other room in your home. Happy holidays! [gallery ids="102172,132352,132341,132334,132328,132320,132305,132347,132362,132312,132357" nav="thumbs"]

The Utensils: From Eating to Dining
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Early Americans were close to medieval in their dining habits. Even though people have been sharing communal meals with their families and friends from the beginning of civilization, early meals in Colonial America were more a matter of crude survival.
Most foods in the colony-building 17th century consisted of one-pot dishes like stews, porridges and puddings, meals that are suited for cooking over an open fire. Tableware and dining utensils were scarce; hence, meals were eaten from shared utensils, bowls and wooden cups, called noggins, passed from mouth to mouth. Although using communal tableware was borne of necessity, it was also customary, as the Puritan ethic espoused frugality and simplicity. It was related that a newcomer to one New England town brought individual trenchers for each member of his family and was admonished by the town magistrates for being too extravagant.
A typical family ate off trenchers, a 10- or 12-inch rectangular block of wood about three inches thick with a bowl shape carved into it. After the main course, the trencher was turned over and dessert was served on the clean side. A poor, rural family might eat from a trencher that was actually a table of sorts made from a long block of wood with a “V” shaped trough cut through the center into which the stew was poured and shared by all. Some families dispensed with trenchers altogether, and ate “spoon meat,” roasted meat served on thick slices of bread.

Prior to the American Revolution, most Americans ate with spoons made from shell, horn, wood or gourds. Sharp knives, also used as weapons, were initially used less to cut meat, than to anchor it down while people tore off a piece with their hands and shoved it into their mouths. The blunt-tipped knives imported to the colonies were the precursors to the fork and often food was brought to the mouth on the flat edge of the knife. Until the late 18th century, forks were still uncommon in the colonies and deemed a curiosity. Since the new blunt knives made it difficult to spear food, the two-prong fork was used to hold meat while being cut — but still not so helpful for holding bites of food.

By the middle of the 18th century, early Americans began to acquire more wealth and mass-produced dining utensils were becoming more available and affordable. A sign of refinement was the appearance of individual place settings. The simple fork significantly refined table manners, as hands were no longer used to reach for food and greasy fingers no longer wiped on the tablecloth.

Although forks had been used by the French court as early as the 14th century, they were used only when eating exotic foods or foods that could easily stain the hands. By the 17th century, travelers had spread the word about this eating invention. It became commonplace throughout Europe, but the colonies still refused to use the fork. They looked upon it as an effeminate and useless curiosity. Finally, by the early 19th century, the three- and four-prong forks, developed in England and Germany, were becoming the primary eating utensil in America and marked the real beginning of civilized dining by Americans.

Meanwhile, fewer middle and upper class folk ate from a common serving bowl. Pewter plates began replacing wooden trenchers, and many affluent households did not use woodenware at all. However, people living far out in the newer settlements, away from transportation centers used it for about 200 years. China first made an appearance in the early 18th century, but was found only in wealthier households — and it rarely came out of the china closet.

By the middle of the 19th century, dining in America was not just about eating. Victorians, with their love of making any simple gathering an event, were the first to identify a specific room for dining. They introduced a bewildering assortment of silver flatware, a far cry from the simple knives of their ancestors. There was a specialized utensil for every conceivable use. There was a spoon for cream soup, a special spoon for clear soup, luncheon knives, dinner knives and coffee spoons, dinner spoons,

dessert spoons and so on. There were so many dining accoutrements that it seemed there was scarcely room on the table for the food.
Even though the United States was one of the last regions to adopt spoons and forks, we still tuck into great fried chicken using our most efficient eating tools — those located on the ends of our arms.

Michelle Galler (antiques.and.whimsies@gmail.com) is an antiques dealer, design consultant and realtor based in Georgetown. Her shop is in Rare Finds, in Washington, Virginia.

Tax Time — It’s Either You or Your Uncle
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Did you know that if you pay $10,000 in taxes this year it could easily amount to over $26,000 in wealth over 25 years?

Far too often I see clients who unnecessarily give away money, both in taxes and lost earnings that could have earned them a sizeable rate of return over their lifetimes — and a sizeable fortune for many investors.

As the end of the year approaches, now is the last chance for many to reduce their 2015 tax burden. Unfortunately, many investors focus on getting a one- or two-percent higher return on their portfolio or perfecting the target price on their stock while leaving the 20 to 30 percent of what they can control on the table for their accountant to handle.

We all know we can’t control the markets, interest rates, the economy or numerous other life events that can wreak havoc on our portfolios. But what we can control is how many of our hard-earned dollars we give away each year to Uncle Sam — and our ability to control this typically diminishes as we age.

There are many lists and articles out there extolling the top five things you can do to reduce taxes by year-end, such as maximizing retirement contributions, paying January’s mortgage payment in December, bunching medical deductions in one year and tax-loss harvesting. But here are a few other suggestions that may be new to you.

• If you have inherited a Roth IRA or an IRA and you don’t take a required minimum distribution like those individuals over 70, you will be subject to a 50-percent penalty.

• Medical expense deductions have risen to 10 percent of your adjusted gross income versus 7.5 percent for certain income groups (other than retirees).

• If you are a military family, you are eligible to put your Servicemembers Group Life Insurance benefits in a Roth IRA.

• If you have lost a family member who was receiving a federal government pension, your unrecovered after-tax contributions are deductible in the year of death. This is a huge benefit commonly overlooked, especially in our community.

• If you have made a statement of charitable intent or a promised future gift, consider setting up a charitable gift fund in a high-income year, even though the gift can be made over time.

• Finally, beware of the hidden tax inside your mutual funds. In a volatile year like 2015, many investors will see their portfolio lose value, then wake up April 15 to a surprise: a tax liability.

“The hardest thing to understand is the income tax,” said Albert Einstein. About this, and so many other things, he was right. So this holiday season, take a few minutes to seek out the help of a professional — or go online and look up “overlooked tax mistakes.” Because once it’s gone, it’s gone.

Author of “Take Back Your Money” and “The Ten Truths of Wealth Creation,” John E. Girouard is a registered principal of Cambridge Investment Research and an Investment Advisor Representative of Capital Investment Advisors in Bethesda, Maryland.

The Auction Block: December 2, 2015
• December 7, 2015

Sotheby’s??

“À la Source,” 1982?

Baltasar Lobo (1910–1993)? ??

Auction Date: December 7?

Estimate: $60,000 – $80,000??

Sotheby’s Impressionist & Modern Art Sale will feature a broad array of pictures, works on paper and sculpture by artists of the late 19th and early 20th centuries, including this Carrara marble piece. Highlights include important works on canvas by Pierre Eugène Montézin and Jean Dufy, two exceptional sculptures by Lynn Chadwick and works on paper by Daumier and Lautrec.

Bonhams

Sapphire and Diamond Ring

Tiffany & Co.??

Auction Date: December 8

Estimate: $400,000 – $600,000

This glowing, opalescent rare sapphire and diamond ring from Tiffany & Co. is part of Bonhams upcoming Fine Jewelry auction. The ring centers a cushion-cut sapphire, weighing approximately 8.05 carats, flanked by old European-cut diamonds, which continue to a plain mount.

Weschler’s

Serpentine Chest of Drawers, c. 1800–1805?

Attributed to Nathan Lombard (1777–1847)

Auction Date: December 4

Estimate: $30,000 – $50,000

A Federal inlaid cherry serpentine chest of drawers, attributed to Nathan Lombard, is one of the highlights of Weschler’s Capital Collections Estate Auction. The chest features trailing floral inlay along its leafage-carved concave quarter-columns, as well as Lombard’s distinctive cusp-and-spur feet and signature applied beaded strip along the back edge of the top.

Doyle New York

Platinum, Gold and Fancy Yellow Diamond Ring

Auction Date: December 16

Estimate: $100,000 – $150,000

Part of Doyle New York’s upcoming Important Jewelry auction, this marvelous 18-karat ring centers one old European-cut fancy yellow diamond of approximately 8.02 carats in a ring signed Tiffany & Co. The diamond is not original to the mounting.

Freeman’s

“Two Old Men and a Dog: Checkers,” 1950?

Norman Rockwell (1894–1978)?

Auction Date: December 6

Estimate: $60,000 – $100,000

This iconic drawing by Norman Rockwell is one of four seasonal studies (also to be offered are “Spring,” “Summer” and “Fall”). Other lots in Freeman’s American Art and Pennsylvania Impressionists sale are stunning watercolors by Andrew Wyeth and paintings by Maxfield Parrish and Arthur Dove. ?

Bringing the Hammer Down

Final selling prices for last month’s featured Auction Block items

Sotheby’s

“Stabile with Mobile Element,”?1952

Lynn Chadwick (1914–2003)

Auction Date: November 17–18

Estimate: $400,000 – $600,000

Final Selling Price: $749,000

Freeman’s

Virginia Blanket Chest, 1798

Johannes Spitler (1774–1837)

Auction Date: November 11

Estimate: $40,000 – $60,000

Final Selling Price: $56,250?

Bonhams

“Dorothy” Dress?Worn in “The Wizard of Oz”??

Auction Date: November 23??

Estimate: $800,000 – $1.2 million

Final Selling Price: $1.56 million

Doyle New York

“Three Survivors,” 1964

Ibrahim Hussein (1936–2009)

Auction Date: November 10

Estimate: $10,000 – $15,000

Final Selling Price: $62,500

The Little Woman Who Started the Big Holiday
• November 19, 2015

When Abraham Lincoln met Harriet Beecher Stowe, the author of “Uncle Tom’s Cabin,” he was reported to have said, “So you are the little woman who started the big war.” He fully comprehended the influence of her book — turning the national tide against slavery and making the war inevitable.
Lincoln placed a lot of weight on Stowe’s influence and that of other women who advised him, whether the advice was solicited or not. Once such female advisor was an 11-year-old girl who wrote him a letter when he was running for president, suggesting he would look a lot better if he had a beard. Lincoln grew a beard, and it did improve his looks.

His wife, Mary Todd Lincoln, advised him during their courtship and throughout their marriage, especially when it came to political matters. When he won the presidential election in 1860, Abe said, “Mary, Mary, we are elected!”

Another persistent (if unsolicited) female advisor was Sarah Josepha Hale, a remarkable woman who was unrelenting in her drive to make Thanksgiving a national holiday. As it turns out, Thanksgiving was declared a holiday by numerous presidents in various ways, but Lincoln was the first to make it a national holiday by proclamation.

Sarah Josepha Hale was a woman ahead of her time. Her mother insisted that she get a good education through home schooling, since colleges would not accept women at that time. When her brother went to Dartmouth, he shared his textbooks with her. At age 18, she began teaching school. Six years later, she married David Hale, an intellectual who shared her scholarly interests; the two studied and wrote together. When her husband died two weeks before their fifth child was born, she had to figure out how to support herself and her children.

She started a women’s magazine, which she used as a forum for promoting women’s rights, including equal pay and property rights for women. Then she became the editor of “Godey’s Lady’s Book,” keeping that job for 40 years. It had a following of 150,000 — huge for that time. She also wrote cookbooks, children stories and poems, including “Mary Had a Little Lamb.” She was influential in the founding of Vassar College for women, raising funds to construct the Bunker Hill Monument in Massachusetts and saving George Washington’s estate, Mount Vernon.

Hale’s family had always celebrated Thanksgiving with an elaborate feast and she promoted the holiday in her magazines and in her novel, “Northwood.” When war broke out, she urged both the North and South to celebrate Thanksgiving. Finally, after many letters to Lincoln, Secretary of State William Seward drafted an official proclamation in October of 1863, assigning the last Thursday of November for the national observation of Thanksgiving. In making the proclamation in the midst of the last year of the Civil War, Lincoln said he hoped this holiday would “heal the wounds of the nation.”

In “Northwood,” Hale described a sumptuous Thanksgiving feast similar to the one she had enjoyed with her own family: “The roasted turkey took precedence … and well did it become its lordly station, sending forth the rich odor of its savory stuffing.” The rest of the meal included “a sirloin of beef, a leg of pork and loin of mutton, gravy and vegetables, a goose and a pair of ducklings, chicken pie, plates of pickles and preserves, wheat bread, sweetmeats, fruits and wine, cider and ginger beer, plum pudding, custards and pies including pumpkin pie.”

Hungry yet? And just think of the leftovers …

Happy Thanksgiving!

Owner and broker of the largest woman-owned and woman-run real estate firm in the Washington metropolitan area, Donna Evers is the proprietor of Twin Oaks Tavern Winery in Bluemont, Virginia, and a devoted student of Washington-area history. Reach her at devers@eversco.com.

Hitting Delete on Social Security Provisions
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The Social Security Handbook has 2,728 separate rules governing benefits. But that’s just the handbook. The Social Security Administration operating system has thousands more rules and interpretations, putting to shame the 72,000 pages often cited by political candidates about the Internal Revenue Code.

It’s no wonder that most retirees give up between 20 and 30 percent of the benefits they are entitled to; the rules and guidelines are overwhelming. And it’s no wonder that nearly half of all retirees accept a reduction of between 20 and 25 percent of their full retirement benefit and forgo a whopping 32 percent increase in income by not waiting until age 70.

With help it is extremely difficult to get it right — but getting it right on your own is nearly impossible. A 62-year-old couple has over 100 million combinations of months for each of the two spouses to take retirement benefits, take spousal benefits and decide whether or not to file or suspend retirement benefits. For couples with significant age differences the number of combinations can be even more daunting.
It was just a few years ago that the financial industry doled out advice and recommendations based on a simple, unsophisticated break-even calculation. But ever since a retired SSA employee began writing a weekly column, the general public and the financial services industry have begun to understand what in the past only the rule makers understood. The result of these revelations is that many of the strategies that have been brought to light have become Congress’s most recent victims.

The last major change was during the Reagan Administration, when, in an effort to stem the tide of budget deficits, a bipartisan solution was devised to tax retiree benefits instead of cutting them. This achieved the same result in a more politically expedient manner than an outright reduction.

Now, unlike an IRA that one contributes to before taxes and pays taxes on later, we have to pay taxes both going in and coming out.

In a provision labeled “closure of unintended loopholes,” the recent budget compromise eliminates two popular claiming strategies for those born after January 1, 1954: file and suspend; and filing for a restricted claim of spousal benefits. For many couples, this strategy translates to a six-figure windfall. For anyone born after 1954, you just lost a great benefit.

The cold hard truth about government money is that you don’t own it and you cannot control it. But for those of you eligible for Social Security, you should do your homework. For everyone else, Congress still has 2,728 rules and hundreds of thousands of provisions that it can simply hit the delete key on to solve their problems.

Author of “Take Back Your Money” and “The Ten Truths of Wealth Creation,” John E. Girouard is a registered principal of Cambridge Investment Research and an Investment Advisor Representative of Capital Investment Advisors in Bethesda, Maryland.

Inside Bill Dean’s Waterfront Miami Compound
• November 5, 2015

After renovating his P street home and building the award-winning Oyster House in the northern neck of Virginia, Georgetown’s best-known bachelor Bill Dean set his sights on something bigger: a waterfront compound in Miami Beach.

Dean checked out the sprawling $8 million property in Miami Beach, which was built by Sebastian Spering Kresge of K-Mart fame, for the first time in 2009. Shortly after, he flew in local architect Dale Overmyer, who spearheaded Dean’s earlier architectural projects, to take a peak. After the two talked over the necessary renovations, Dean bought the place and Overmyer got to work upgrading it, reportedly costing Dean over $32 million.

“We ended up completely rebuilding every inch of it,” Overmyer says.

Photos from the site in 2010 show something that looks more like a warzone than a construction site. (Overmyer says, “We saved two trees but there wasn’t a blade of grass left [post-construction.]”)

The finished project, on the other hand, is unrivaled by even the Playboy Mansion, with 11 bedrooms (and even more bathrooms), a number of courtyards, several swimming pools, a tennis court, a Grotto, a nightclub, a spa, a gym and much more. (“Ballers,” a fictional show glamorizing the lives of NFL players, shot two episodes at the compound.)

“I got to work with some wonderfully exotic materials,” Overmyer says of the project, touching on the handmade shells that cover the interior of the Grotto’s roof and the circular tiles that look like suction cups in the compound’s “Octopus Room” before noting the master bathroom’s Roman tub.

Check out selected images from Bill Dean’s Miami villa below and be sure to read our feature on Overmyer architects in the Nov. 4 issue of The Georgetowner.
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Georgetown’s Dale Overmyer
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Dale Overmyer is a star architect in Georgetown. His tailored suit goes with the role, but his modest, soft-spoken demeanor seems out of place when he’s discussing the 100-plus renovations he’s done in Georgetown, the homes he has built in Palm Beach and the Hamptons and the architectural work he has done for Georgetown engineering executive Bill Dean, a.k.a. the “Jay Gatsby of Miami.” (Dean hired Overmyer to design both his Oyster House in Virginia’s Northern Neck and Terra Veritatis, his 11-bedroom Mediterranean-style villa compound in Miami Beach.)

In Overmyer’s telling, he was born to build in Georgetown. His grandfather, a general contractor, passed on some carpentry skills to his father, who, says Overmyer, “was talented at drawing and painting but never pursued his artistic interests.” Overmyer was raised “with tremendous focus on art and drawing” — which came in handy growing up in West Africa without TV or radio. “Legos were the only toy I had,” he says.

As Overmyer got older, he became more and more interested in building things: forts and tree houses and go-carts. When he was 8 years old, his dad gave him a jigsaw. “Who gives their kids power tools at 8 years old?” he reflects now.

Born in Venezuela, Overmyer was always on the move with his family, which exposed him to breathtaking structures on several continents. He recalls being struck by architecture everywhere he traveled: by the majesty of Saint Basil’s Cathedral in Moscow, by the mix of modern and traditional architecture along the Angolan coast, by the urban landscape of London, by the monumental and symbolic buildings at Dulles Airport, by Georgetown’s history and character.

He came to the U.S. every year or so to visit his aunt, uncle and cousins on Reservoir Road in Georgetown, his “home in America.” That was when Overmyer fell in love with Georgetown.

Ultimately, his family moved back to the U.S., settling in Houston when he was 13. Overmyer stayed in the area through college — he earned his Bachelor of Architecture degree at the University of Texas — then moved to Georgetown with his wife Melissa “immediately after school.” For his thesis project, Overmyer had used Georgetown as a model for creating a pedestrian-based, sustainable community.

While other architects may shy away from working in Georgetown, fearing the seemingly all-powerful Old Georgetown Board, Overmyer cherishes the challenges. “A lot of people consider it to be a real briar patch, but it’s my briar patch and I really enjoy it,” he says of the process of building and renovating homes in Georgetown. Though the rules can be burdensome, “they have made Georgetown, and kept it, a good place.”

Lately, Overmyer has been dealing with the Old Georgetown Board on his own behalf, proposing renovations for his family’s new home on S Street. “The Old Georgetown Board described the new home as ‘a dog’s breakfast of a house,’ which only makes me happy, because I love potential,” he says with a smile.

The new digs provide more room for his kids — ages 9, 19, 21 and 23 — and there is a first-floor master bedroom to accommodate him and his wife as they age. (Plus, it has a parking space, a hot commodity in Georgetown.)

Excerpts from The Georgetowner’s recent interview with Overmyer, edited for clarity, appear below.

The Georgetowner: How do you approach the renovation of an older home in a historic district? Is the process limiting?

Dale Overmyer: It’s limiting, but it’s also educational. Everyone that lives in a house exerts some influence on it. We try to draw out things that are unique and creative about our clients with the architecture we do — of course, being mindful of the people that came before them and their expressions.

It must be an intimate process.

It really is. When we work, we want to understand how our clients want to live in their house. We think about who is in there, how many people and what are they doing. We want your environment to perfectly fit your lifestyle.

That information must be important when you’re building a house from scratch too, right?

When we build something new, we are looking back into our clients’ childhood dreams and fantasies. We imagine what a beautiful place to live in the new home could be. It’s really more of a guide service. We want to take people to places they’ve dreamed about but where they can’t take themselves. We want to take them farther than they imagined.

Who is your typical client?

Our typical client is somebody who always wanted to be an architect themselves. That is almost universally true. The typical client is someone who has been very successful and is very interested in being creative, but they are usually in a field that doesn’t yield the kind of creativity that they like. So they enjoy the creative process of design and building, and it gets that inner architect out of their system. We really enjoy working collaboratively with clients to draw out as much experience, talent and creativity as possible. It just enriches the project.

If they have the capacity, what people find is that investing in good buildings is a good investment. It’s one they can enjoy personally and it adds value to their portfolio. If they can, they build as much as they can. It’s an expensive pastime but it’s a good investment.

What is the typical project in Georgetown like?

A lot will just have a small addition and need a lot of interior work. A house will really need to have a complete reworking every 50 years, especially if it hasn’t really had infrastructure done in the 20th century. Some previous owners have gotten away with doing very little in terms of air conditioning and plumbing. So we do a lot of gut jobs.

In addition, some homes in Georgetown have been carved into the tiniest little rooms. Our effort is often to simplify those small, cramped spaces into fewer, bigger, simpler spaces. Fewer, bigger, simpler is my mantra.

And what are the usual results?

One of the things we do a lot of work on is rewriting the social equation for modern living. Since the late part of the 20th century, Americans moved into more informal lifestyles. We do our own cooking and we do our own cleaning now. Congregating in the house typically happens around meals, so the family room and the kitchen are really the new heart of the home. Those rooms used to be hidden away and given as little space as possible. Now they are the main area of living in the house. So we are rewriting a formula to respond to how people live now.

In fact, I just interviewed for Julia Child’s house. I don’t have that job yet, but I would love to play out the possibilities there, because shows like hers turned the act of preparing a meal into part of the entertainment and the kitchen into a community space. That would be a neat way to tie up a lot of the things that have kept me busy over the years.

What is your favorite house in Georgetown that you haven’t worked on?

We are basically living in a museum. And the museum has so much variety of time and style. It’s entertaining that many houses are similar, but every one is absolutely unique and has a story to tell and has usually been taken care of by people that love them. I think of the whole neighborhood being the real gem.

I describe it as a quaint village within a big city. It has the best of both worlds. It has everything that a child or teenager or student or young adult or someone in their midlife or someone aging in place could want. It’s a vital and relevant community wherever you are in life. It also has probably the most interesting collection of citizens past and present of any neighborhood in the world.

I’ve always lived and worked in Georgetown. That’s the model for how people should live. [gallery ids="102345,125535,125546,125541" nav="thumbs"]

The Auction Block November 5, 2015
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Freeman’s

“Huntsmen and Hounds, North Cornish Hunt,” 1954

Sir Alfred Munnings (1878–1959)?

Estimate: $250,000 – $400,000

Auction Date: November 19

Sir Alfred Munnings is widely considered to have been the greatest equestrian artist of the 20th century. His work continues to have a devoted following. Munnings’s love of the Cornish landscape stemmed from visits he had made between 1910 and 1914 to Newlyn, an area that at that time was home to a renowned artists colony. This painting is part of Freeman’s Sporting Sale.

Christie’s

“Norman Rockwell Visits a Country Editor,” 1946

Norman Rockwell (1894–1978)

Estimate: $10 million – $15 million

Auction Date: November 19

The top lot of Christie’s American Art auction, this major, large-scale work belongs to an important series of works Norman Rockwell completed for the Saturday Evening Post at the height of his career. The painting is being sold by the National Press Club Journalism Institute with the approval of the National Press Club. The proceeds from the sale will benefit both nonprofit organizations.

Bonhams

“The Cove, Isles of Shoals,” 1901

Childe Hassam (1859–1935)? ???

Estimate: $400,000 – $600,000

Auction Date: November 18

This painting, offered as part of Bonhams’ American art sale, comes from a prime period of Hassam’s work, when he painted on the Island of Appledore, the largest of the Isles of Shoals. It manifests, with direct fluent brushwork, the brilliant midday light, clear sky, calm water and scintillating array of blues, reds, yellows and greens that he encountered. About nine miles off the New Hampshire coast, the Isles of Shoals were a source of inspiration and refuge for Hassam between about 1880 and 1916.

Doyle New York

“I Been Rebuked and I Been Scorned,” 1954

Charles White (1918–1979)

Estimate: $70,000 – $90,000

Auction Date: November 10

Named for a Negro spiritual, this charcoal and wash drawing was created nine years before the historic March on Washington in August of 1963, at which an estimated 250,000 people witnessed Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. deliver his famous “I Have a Dream” speech. At this same gathering, Mahalia Jackson sang “I’ve Been ’Buked and I’ve Been Scorned.” The work is part of Doyle New York’s Post-War and Contemporary Art sale.

Sotheby’s??

Pale Blue Faience Ushabti of Neferibresaneith,?570–526 B.C.??

Estimate: $60,000 – $90,000

Auction Date: December 8

Sotheby’s will present an inaugural sale dedicated exclusively to Ancient Egyptian Sculpture and Works of Art. Highlights include a red granite portrait head of King Amenhotep III from the last ten years of his reign, two exceptional stone ushabtis and the piece featured here, 7.25 inches high, one of the best preserved faience ushabtis of Neferibresaneith.

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The Art and Fashion of Mourning
• October 29, 2015

Thanks to Halloween, this is the month of the macabre, which makes it a perfect time of year to discuss antique mourning jewelry.

Death came early and often in the 17th, 18th and 19th centuries. In Colonial America, or the Georgian era (1714 to 1837), the specter of death was persistent. Much art and jewelry design was focused on the concept of Memento Mori: the medieval practice of pondering mortality and the salvation of the soul. Through the 1700s, jewelry of this type often featured ghoulish images of skulls, gravediggers and coffins.

Although people had made jewelry to commemorate death for centuries, it wasn’t until the reign of Queen Victoria that pieces were made to remember a dead individual. Before photography, the only way for people to remember a loved one was to create a touchstone that could be carried every day as a reminder.

In 1861, after the death of her beloved Albert, Queen Victoria went into perpetual mourning. The queen’s epic sadness over her loss was a major catalyst for mourning fashion. Her reign marked the height of the mourning industry.

For decades, Queen Victoria wore only black clothing and matching mourning jewelry, popularizing the tradition both in England and in the U.S. During her reign, mourning grew into a respectful, yet fashionable practice. Women became quite interested in wearing attractive mourning dresses and jewelry.

The etiquette for mourning fashion became so stringent, elaborate and confusing that magazines published guides and schedules, describing, for example, how a widow’s mourning was expected to last two years. During the first year, she was allowed to wear only black clothing and jewelry, which led to a tremendous rise in the popularity of jet — black, fossilized coal — in jewelry design.

Although black was the obvious color for mourning jewelry, certain distinctions were made about the piece’s surface. Since the earliest stages of mourning were strictly regulated, it was considered poor taste to wear highly polished jet too soon. So matte-finished pieces were made for early mourning.

Black enamel, along with jet, was the hallmark of most — but not all — mourning jewelry. Pieces that used white enamel meant that the deceased woman was unmarried and pearls signified the loss of a child.

During the Victorian period, symbols of death softened into angels, clouds, weeping willows and urns. Phrases like “in memory of” and “lost but not forgotten” were frequently used in jewelry designs along with gemstones.

As the middle class rose and desired more affordable options, bits of the deceased’s hair were worked into more pieces. Hairwork refers to jewelry and art made from woven human hair. The intimacy of preserving someone’s memory by using a lock of his or her hair appealed to many.

The popularity of hairwork created a large market for mass-produced gold fittings for specially commissioned items using the deceased’s hair. People made wreaths, men’s watch fobs, bracelets, necklaces and brooches out of human hair. During the mid-1800s, with the increased demand for hairwork as mourning jewelry, there was widespread distrust of jewelers who neglected to use the deceased’s hair in “custom-made” pieces. In fact, more than 50 tons of bulk human hair were imported to England annually to be used by the country’s jewelers.

The high mortality rate of the First World War led to a decline in the formality of mourning. This period of mass human attrition blurred the lines of mourning regulations. Families felt personally impacted by the Great War. Death was closer, a part of day-to-day life. Public mourning codes became a burden. So many people were trying to cope with grief that mourning fashion and strict codes were increasingly viewed as affectations.

By the 1920s, people were tired of drab mourning clothing and even the concept of a regulated mourning period seemed antiquated. The fashion of mourning was soon abandoned.

Our own Tudor Place has an extensive collection of hairwork mourning jewelry, including a gold-edged locket containing locks of George Washington’s hair. In 2010, curators discovered a locket from 1845 in the Tudor Place archives with a lock of child’s hair that belonged to an ancestor of the Armisteads, the last owners of the property.

Michelle Galler, a specialist in American primitives and folk art, lives in Georgetown. Her shop is in Rare Finds in Washington, Virginia. Reach her at antiques.and.whimsies@gmail.com. [gallery ids="102333,125767" nav="thumbs"]