How the Industrial Revolution Changed Jewellery

The Industrial Revolution was a period of change that transformed Britain from a land of small workshops and cottages into an industrial powerhouse.

What was the Industrial Revolution? (1750-1900)

Before the Industrial Revolution most manufacture in Britain was carried out in workshops or at home. This was a labour intensive and small scale process with products being sold primarily at local markets. From the mid 1700s, everything began to change. Due to wealth generated by the British empire and global trading creating a demand for industrialisation, new machinery began to be created to speed up the process and generate goods on a larger scale. This marked the beginning of the Industrial Revolution, a period of transformation that reshaped Britain. It’s worth noting that the exact dates of the Industrial Revolution are not set in stone and some historians distinguish between a first and second Industrial Revolution, each marked by different waves of technological and social change.

One of the most important breakthroughs came in 1778 when the steam engine was invented by James Watt and Matthew Boulton. By burning coal to heat water and create steam, a new power source was created to drive machinery on a grand scale. This in turn created a huge demand for coal leading to dangerous and gruelling work in mines and prompted the construction of factories near water supplies.

The increase in production prompted improvements for transport as goods could no longer be confined to local markets and needed to be moved quickly to wider audiences. Roads were improved and tolls introduced to fund their maintenance and the invention of tarmac in the 1820s made roads more reliable in wet and cold weather. Canals were dug to allow the transport of large and heavy goods and the greatest leap came in 1829 with the invention of the locomotive engine. Railways spread across the country reducing both travel times and cost. As a result of these fast changes, people began to flock from rural villages to cities in search of work. Censuses show the population of London soar from 959,000 in 1801 to 5,570,870 in 1901.

What techniques did it create in jewellery?

The Industrial Revolution had a huge impact of the jewellery trade. Processes that had once been painstakingly slow and carried out by hand were now adapted to new technologies that allowed for speed and affordability. For the first time, jewellery could be created on a scale large enough to recede beyond the elite and upperclass.

Electroplating

In 1805, the Italian chemist Luigi Valentino Brugnatelli successfully coated a sheet of silver with a thin layer of gold using Alessandro Volta’s newly invented ‘voltaic pile’, the world’s first electrical battery. His discovery was ahead of its time and it would not be until the 1840s that the process was revived and refined. John Wright, working in Birmingham, discovered that gold and silver could be dissolved in potassium cyanide and used in electroplating. By the mid-1850s electroplating was in common use for silverware and jewellery, producing items that mimicked the appearance of solid gold or silver but at a fraction of the price.

Cut steel

Cut steel jewellery is jewellery made of faceted steel studs. Already in place before the Industrial Revolution, worn as a substitute to diamond jewellery as the steel studs would be faceted, polished and riveted to a back plate. This created a wonderful sparkle in light that danced and glittered, as hand cut studs could have up to 15 facets. Large demands for the jewellery saw a British entrepreneur named Sykes create a cut steel jewellery business In Paris, however the French revolution drove the location of manufacture transfer to Britain. By the time of the Industrial Revolution, mass manufacture was able to create ribbons of studs by stamping them with a machine instead of hand faceting and riveting them into place.

Gemstone cutting

Where once stones were shaped with hand-cranked or pedal powered devices, new steam powered tools allowed for greater speed and accuracy. Facets could be cut more sharply and in greater numbers, enhancing the brilliance of gems. The invention of the motorised diamond saw in 1900 marked another milestone, making it possible to split diamonds with precision and ushering in the transition towards the “brilliant” styles that dominate today.

Thin gauge gold, stamping and pressing

The ability to produce thin gold sheet using rolling mills was equally transformative and allowed for the mass manufacture of jewellery. Instead of hammering metal into flat sheets, which was both labour-intensive and limited in how fine it could be made, rolling mills produced uniform, thin sheets of metal. These could then be pressed with steel dies to create intricate patterns and shapes, considerably speeding up the process of what had once been laboriously hand engraved. Pressing and stamping not only reduced the cost of production but also allowed jewellers to experiment with highly decorative motifs, often enhanced with affordable gemstones such as garnets or chrysoberyls rather than diamonds, sapphires or rubies.

Strass pioneered paste

In the 1730s glass with high lead content was created by George Frederic Strass who is credited with the invention of colourless paste. Paste stones soon because popular in their own right, as opposed to just diamond stimulants. Many colours of paste were created by adding different ingredients to the mix and stones were foil backed and faceted in different ways to create new and beautiful stones. Despite being a cheaper alternative, admired by both the aristocracy and the growing middle class. Other imitation stones followed this, such as opaline glass imitated opals with its pastel iridescent sheen and French jet, a black glass used to imitate jet.

Wedgwood

V&A Wedgwood Ring

Ceramics entered the jewellery world thanks to Josiah Wedgwood, who established his pottery works in 1759. His most famous creation of jasperware was made in pale tones such as blue, green and lilac and decorated with applied white classical reliefs. These designs translated beautifully into cameos, which became highly fashionable during the late 18th and 19th centuries. he used plaster moulds for mass production and offered his products by mail order with free delivery. Cameos that once would have required hours of skilled hand carving could now be purchased at a price accessible to a far wider public

Final thoughts

The impact of these innovations was immense. Jewellery was no longer the exclusive preserve of the wealthy elite, the middle and sometimes even working classes could own personal adornments. Mass production and the use of less costly materials reduced prices dramatically, while industrial efficiency sped up output, noticeably changing the jewellery industry. While some loved the jewellery products of the Industrial Revolution, some did not, creating the Arts and crafts and Art Nouveau movements in the late 1800s to early 1900s.