ART NOUVEAU: Lilies

And here's where we bring my week of Art Nouveau buttons to a close. Let's revisit the meaning of Art Nouveau, a term borrowed from the French to describe an international style that came into prominence between 1890 and 1915. The style began in Europe where it was apparent in paintings, interior design, glass, jewelry, ceramics, metalwork, furniture, architecture and even buttons. Of the five buttons I've posted this week, this one's my favorite even though it doesn't boast a bead or a gemstone like the others. Instead, we have four elegant and long-stemmed lilies leaning this way and that way quite beautifully and pinned on a black Bakelite base that's carved on angled sides at the left and right. The button caught my eye five years ago at the famous "Tender Buttons" button shop in Manhattan that I've mentioned a few times over the years on this blog. Steeply priced at over $100, the button beguiled me with its poetic allure; and today it stands as one of my absolute trophies of vintage fashion—even an exquisite masterpiece. 

Now to bring this Art Nouveau-themed week to a fitting end, here's a photograph of one of the Art Nouveau subway signs in Paris, France. When I was in The City of Light a few years ago, these "Metropolitain" signs at the mouth of every subway entrance, absolutely charmed me with their Parisian glamour. Of course, the fonts and shapely contours of these old signposts epitomize the style we describe as Art Nouveau.

-Sherbert McGee 

“Beauty is a form of Genius—is higher, indeed, than Genius,
as it needs no explanation. It is one of the great facts of the world,
like sunlight, or springtime, or the reflection in the dark waters
of that silver shell we call the moon. It cannot be questioned.
It has divine right of sovereignty. It makes princes of those who have it.”
—Oscar Wilde