Where was a mourning brooch worn?

Classically in three positions. At the collar (the highest buttonhole position) as the unobtrusive standard placing. Centrally on the breast as the visible principal position in formal mourning. On the mourning veil (pinned at the edge of the veil) as a special widow's variant during the first year of mourning. In half-mourning also at the side of the shoulder or on the hem of a mourning cloak.

What size is typical?

Larger than brooches usual today. Victorian mourning brooches often measure 4 to 7 cm along their principal axis, with individual display pieces up to 10 cm. Size was part of the logic of visibility - mourning jewellery was meant to be recognisable. Smaller brooches (2–3 cm) are usually half-mourning pieces of the 1880s and 1890s.

What does a mourning brooch contain on its reverse?

Very frequently a hollow setting for hair, holding a lock of the deceased person's hair beneath rock crystal. Some pieces also have an inscription tablet with initials and a date of death, while others combine the two. Early Victorian brooches additionally carry a safety chain, since the heavy pieces might otherwise fall from the clothing.

Are mourning brooches still made today?

Practically not. The brooch as a jewellery form is marginal in everyday twenty-first-century wear; as a mourning piece it is all but extinct. Collectors work exclusively with historical pieces. Workshops today make mourning pendants rather than mourning brooches - the gesture has moved from the breast to the chain.

Mourning Brooch

The mourning brooch is the central women's jewellery form of Victorian mourning wear - a brooch, often the size of a palm, pinned to dress, collar or veil, and today an almost exclusively historical field of collecting.

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