The hidden gems of the Fitzwilliam Museum

Several decades later we find Charles Ricketts making his way to 115 Piccadilly to consult Giuliano's sons - Carlo Joseph and Arthur Alphonse - concerning the making of several pieces of jewellery he had designed for Katherine Bradley and Edith Cooper One of the outstanding pieces in the exhibition is a gold and sapphire Sabbatai ring that Ricketts designed for 'Michael'/Bradley, and Edmund Dulac's glorious icon-like painting Charles Ricketts and Charles Shannon as Medieval Saints hangs nearby They were bought by the Kensington dealer Richard Dennis and subsequently sold to those pioneer collectors Charles and Lavinia Handley-Read.

In those days such objects were despised by the antiques and jewellery trade and even as late as 1975 when, with Charlotte Gere, we mounted an exhibition at the Fine Art Society, 'Jewellery and Jewellery Design 1850-1930', with an entire section of more than a hundred items by John Paul Cooper, including the silver and abalone shell buckle exhibited here, we were mocked by the grand Bond Street jewellery dealers In addition to the Handley-Reads, Helen Ritchie pays tribute to other pioneer collectors, especially those who were benefactors of the Fitzwilliam Museum Ritchie describes her as being in many ways 'the first collector to take jewellery seriously as another avenue of art history, and to study what it could tell us about the lives of those who made and wore it'.

' Although there is enough silver and gold as well as gemstones in the exhibition to give glitter to the displays, many of the Arts and Crafts designers preferred using base metals - pewter, copper and even aluminium - and favoured non-precious stones such as garnets, carnelian and chalcedony as well as enamelling for decoration Designers and Jewellery 1850-1940: Jewellery and Metalwork from the Fitzwilliam Museum is at the Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge until 11 November. . Source