The firm produced distinctive objects inspired by Japanese art and design, North American plants and flowers, and Native American patterns and crafts, adding aesthetic diversity to Tiffany & Co.’s distinguished repertoire. Under his leadership, the Tiffany silver studio was a de facto design school for apprentice silversmiths, who worked alongside head artisan Edward C. When Charles Lewis Tiffany died, in 1902, his son Louis Comfort Tiffany became the firm’s design director. Among the firm’s glittering creations from this time are masterworks of Art Nouveau jewellery, such as this delicate aquamarine necklace and this lavish plique-à-jour peridot and gold necklace, both circa 1900. They also won the firm numerous accolades, including the grand prise for silverware at the Paris Exposition of 1878. Throughout this period, its designs for silver tableware, ceremonial silver, cutlery and jewellery were highly sought-after indicators of status and taste. opened its flagship store, described as a 'palace of jewels' by the New York Times, at 15 Union Square West in Manhattan. From then on, it belonged to the pantheon of American luxury brands.Īt the start of the Gilded Age, in 1870, Tiffany & Co. firm to win an award for excellence in silverware at the Exposition Universelle in Paris. gained international recognition when it became the first U.S. In 1853, Charles Tiffany - who in 1845 had launched the company’s famed catalogue, the Blue Book, and with it, the firm’s signature robin’s-egg blue, which he chose for the cover - shifted the focus to fine jewellery. Young founded it in Connecticut as a “stationery and fancy goods emporium” in 1837, at a time when European imports still dominated the nascent American luxury market. And Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis preferred Tiffany china for state dinners at the White House.Īlthough synonymous with luxury today, the firm started out rather modestly. Vanderbilts, Whitneys, Astors and members of the Russian imperial family all wore Tiffany & Co. A young Franklin Delano Roosevelt proposed to his future wife, Eleanor, with a Tiffany ring in 1904. is one of the most prominent purveyors of luxury goods in the United States, and has long been an important arbiter of style in the design of diamond engagement rings.

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