Harry Iskin vintage costume jewelry

07.01.2020

136 1 minute read

Harry Iskin vintage costume jewelry
American designer Harry Iskin is considered an undeservedly forgotten jeweler. However, products marked “HI” are highly collectible. The history of the brand began in 1930, when Harry Iskin founded the eponymous jewelry brand in the United States.
His parents, emigrants from Russia moved to the UK, and Harry was born there on September 30, 1886. At the age of 22, he moved to the United States, and in 1908 received American citizenship.
Iskin began working as an engraver in a jewelry workshop. In addition, he began to make his jewelry decorations – and their sales were very successful. As a result, in the early 1930s he opened his own atelier, and in 1936 moved to a more spacious building in Philadelphia. His jewelry became so popular that in 1938 he opened a second salon-workshop in Manhattan.
Iskin became famous for the release of high-quality jewelry, as well as silver jewelry, often gold filled. The peak of the popularity of Iskin brooches and bracelets falls on the period of the Second World War, when jewelry from Europe was practically not brought.

Noteworthy, gold plating was often of higher quality than indicated on the product. Marking 1/20 10K GF could be put on the coating with a lot of gold. Iskin made expensive costume jewelry, using silver and gold with crystal rhinestones of the highest class. Sometimes he used a combination of yellow and pink gold as a contrast accent.

Also, Harry Iskin jewelry produced in a small quantities, demonstrate elegant floral design with curls, ribbons and leaves. As a rule, there are very few inserts on brooches, and they themselves can be quite large – their size ranges from 2.5 to 10 cm. No less than the jewelry pieces themselves were famous his boxes – velvet and embossed leather or cardboard.

The company ceased to exist in 1953. On December 28, 1953, The Times wrote about the bankruptcy of the company, and already in January 1954 its property was sold out. The jeweler himself died at the age of 82 in April 1968 in Montgomery, PA.