Bijoux-Bijoux! Costume Jewellery from Chanel to Dior

13 October 2018 - 03 March 2019

The Museum of Decorative Arts at the Kulturforum presents a special exhibition of masterpieces of fashion jewellery from 1930 to 2007.

In the exhibition, visitors will see around 500 creations from over 70 years of fashion jewellery history - from the sober styles of the late 1920s and early 1930s to the audacious and sumptuous parures of the present. The objects from the Gisela Wiegert Collection - all celebrated designs by major fashion houses and renowned designers such as Coco Chanel, Christian Dior and William de Lillo - will be on display for the first time in Berlin.

Costume jewellery as part of haute couture collections

Coco Chanel was the first fashion designer to recognise the creative potential of costume jewellery and to use it as a design element in her collections from the early 1930s onwards. Today, almost every major fashion house creates its own jewellery line season after season. Fashion jewellery or "couture jewellery" has become an integral part of the haute couture collections and develops its own artistic standards that distinguish it from the model of "real" jewellery.

Bijoux-Bijoux! shows the development of costume jewellery from 1930 to today

The exhibition is divided into two parts: A tour of the Fashion Gallery of the Museum of Decorative Arts shows the multifaceted interaction between jewellery and fashion. With works by Coco Chanel, Coppola and Toppo, Eisenberg, Miriam Haskell, Kenneth J. Lane, William de Lillo, Pricharé, Trifari, Elsa Schiaparelli, Vendôme and Albert Weiss, visitors can trace the development of fashion jewellery in Europe and the USA from 1930 to the present day. The second part of the exhibition is devoted exclusively to Dior's creations and shows brilliant parures from 1955 to 2007.