Artwork Page for Vanity Set (Nécessaire)

Details / Information for Vanity Set (Nécessaire)

Vanity Set (Nécessaire)

c. 1750–60

England, London

Medium
gold, agate, interior fitted with gold-mounted implements, mirror
Credit Line
Gift of Howard F. Stirn 2009.70
Public Domain
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Location
Not on view
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Did You Know?

This small box with a mirror-lined lid is a dressing table accessory that contains luxury objects such as a clasp knife, snuff spoon, tweezers, and scent bottles.

Description

Luxurious personal objects were an essential part of a privileged wardrobe during the 1700s and early 1800s, emphasizing their owner’s refinement and wealth. Jewelry, miniatures, and nécessaires—small expensive sets designed to hold grooming, writing, and sewing tools—were often given as intimate gifts, intended to be seen and admired. Their glittering surfaces, however, disguised a system based on the labor and suffering of enslaved or indentured people, whether in gold and stone mines or shops where these goods were made.
A rectangular vanity set features gray and white banded agate stone encased in an intricate gold cage of scrolling leaves and flowers. Gold patterns on the front frame figures of a woman and man flanking a central, clear faceted stone. A horizontal gold band separates the body from its matching lid. Arched gold sections across the surface create windows that reveal the stone's natural, wavy bands beneath.

Vanity Set (Nécessaire)

c. 1750–60

England, London

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