Lotus Brass Button Pendant, Victorian Picture Button, Sterling Silver, Mixed Metals, Spiritual Gift

The lotus has meant something to nearly every culture that encountered it. It rises from muddy water every morning, closes at night, sinks beneath the surface, and comes back the next day without a trace of where it's been. The Victorians pressed it into brass and put it on a dress or a coat where it could be seen and appreciated. 

The scene is a pond: lotus in bloom at the surface, cattails on either side, the water suggested by the darkened recesses of the metal. A fabricated twisted rope border in sterling silver follows the edge, and a scroll-detailed bail in sterling completes the setting. The warm brass and the cool sterling contrast each other beautifully.

Hallmarked Blue Piranha and .925. The pendant measures just over 1 inch (2.5 cm) long from top of bail to bottom of pendant, and ¾ inch (1.9 cm) wide. The circle is about the size of a US dime. Weight is 3.8 grams. 

Each pendant is available without a chain, so you may use your own if you prefer. If you want to add a chain, I offer different lengths and styles. Every chain comes with a 2-inch extender so you can vary the length. Please choose your chain from the options at checkout.

Your purchase arrives gift boxed, presented in a soft pouch with a story card.

Good for: a gift that marks the arrival, not the struggle. For the person whose spiritual life is personal and whose jewelry should be too. A talisman for the woman who rises every morning and makes it look easy.

Questions? Please message me. I'm happy to help.

About the buttons:

The "humble" button was once not-so-humble. Buttons are actually the earliest form of adornment, sewn onto garments as decoration before they had practical use as fasteners. They were once considered works of art.

Many buttons I come across are dusty and languishing in cardboard boxes or mason jars. I set them into precious metals and allow them to live a new life, with those who cherish the magic of past eras.

Victorian buttons take two forms: molded glass, and what are known as picture buttons, or pictorials. Each pictorial has a specific image, often flowers, birds, or other natural forms. These buttons are comprised of several parts, often three to five layers, which would have been hand-assembled in the 19th century. They're beautiful relics of a time long past.

Black glass buttons were in great demand during the Victorian Era. Queen Victoria famously mourned her husband for forty years, and the rest of England followed. Victorians had great interest in art, history, design, flowers, and symbolism, so almost anything could be translated to these tiny whimsies with which they adorned themselves.

The more colorful buttons are 1950s Czech glass, and are no longer made. These are known as "Moonglow" buttons, due to layering a dome of clear glass over a colored satin glass underlayer. Together the two layers create a sort of "cat's-eye" effect, with subtle shifts as the buttons catch the light. They had a short production window from about the early 1950s to the 1960s, when they were displaced by lighter weight (and less expensive) plastic buttons.