Gemstone Fruit Salad & Diamanté Dress Clips

This pair of vintage dress pins has ruby, sapphire, and emerald acorn-shaped glass stones surrounded by diamanté. Costume jewelry makers adopted this practice of molding colored glass in the shapes of leaves or fruits to imitate Indian-carved gemstones used in fine jewelry. Firms such as Cartier and Van Cleef & Arpels popularized these fruit salads or tutti frutti in Art Deco pieces. The trio of rubies, sapphires, and emeralds was a favorite combination. The setting of these classic 1930s dress clips is rhodium-plated base metal. Notice the photo showing one clip worn as a pendant on a sterling silver chain (which is not included), to illustrate the versatility of this type of jewel. You probably have a silver or white-gold necklace that would work as well. The utility patent for the dress clip mechanism is here, shown below the name of Anthony E. Waller.