Costume Jewelry Online

Signed or Unsigned Vintage Jewelry — Which to Buy?

Should you buy signed or unsigned vintage costume jewelry? If you're a beginning collector, that can be a tough question, especially if you don't have a large jewelry budget. In my mind, it depends on what you plan to do with the jewelry. Let's talk about it some.

Buying to Wear

If your main desire is to buy vintage jewelry you can wear, it may not make a difference if the pieces are signed. There are many, many examples of beautiful unmarked vintage jewelry out there. If you are buying to simply wear it, buy what you find pleasing.

A mark or signature is useful for dating a piece of jewelry, but provenance (which I spoke of in this post) can date a piece as well. After all, you don't want to pay a vintage price for a contemporary piece of costume jewelry.

Buying for an Investment Collection

If you plan to buy mainly to collect vintage costume jewelry as an investment, you will want to buy either marked (signed) pieces or book pieces. Both of these types tend to go up in value fastest, and have the best resale value.

A book piece is one that you can see in one of the many wonderful publications on costume jewelry. Even if the piece is unsigned, if it's in a book and attributed to a designer, you can designate it as made by the designer. Just remember to make a note of the book and page number where it's found, and keep that information (or even the book itself) with that piece.

And honestly, not all designers signed all their pieces. For example, the gorgeous (and very valuable) Juliana-style jewelry, made by DeLizza & Elster was only sold with a paper tag as identification! Now I ask you, if you bought a new piece of jewelry to wear, wouldn't you throw away the paper tag? So there will undoubtedly be times when an unsigned piece is known to be made by a specific designer that will complete a set you're collecting.

If you fall into this category, it's best to mostly buy what you like, but there will be times that a piece doesn't appeal to you, but you know it has great value. Grab it if you can get it at a great price.

Buying to Wear and Collect

Many people fall into this category (including me). It's buying not only to build a collection that appreciates over time, but also to be able to wear selected pieces.

If this is where you see yourself, definitely buy what you like. But like the investor, there may be times when a valuable piece of vintage jewelry can be had for a song, which doesn't appeal to you. Snap it up anyway, because you can always resell it later.

I'll post a caveat here; be careful of what you buy to wear if it's an expensive piece. Here's what I mean. For example, I am tough on my bracelets; they get caught on clothes, snagged on furniture and the like. So I almost never wear a collectable bracelet -- too much of a chance of me damaging it.

And strangely, the same holds for me with earrings; I have long hair and wear it loose. Eventually earrings get snagged in my hair, and potentially get lost. (I love earrings, though, so I collect them anyway and just don't wear them.)

So I'll wear my pins, pendants and necklaces because they last and last on me.

The point here is, for anything that you want to buy for its financial appreciation, follow the guidelines for the investor. If you're buying a piece of vintage jewelry simply to wear and enjoy, a signature isn't quite as important. You'll have to make that call on a piece-by-piece basis.

Since I mentioned Juliana-style vintage jewelry, I'll leave you with some Juliana eye candy.