The "Roaring Twenties" also called "The Jazz Age", was a time of rapid change. U. S. women finally got the right to vote with passage of the 19th amendment. Prohibition, cocktail parties, wild dances, and new art forms must have seemed strange to many people used to life before the First World War.

Fashion reflected the fact that women were more independent than ever before. Dresses were short and straight in new, thin fabrics with dropped waists. Women were creating an uproar - cutting or "bobbing" their hair into short styles, wearing makeup, and smoking in public. Their dresses exposed more skin with sleeveless tops, low-cut necklines, see-through areas, and backs cut "down to there". New lifestyles meant there was now a demand for jeweled cigarette cases, cigarette holders, jeweled handbags, and makeup cases. Old ideas of art and design continued through the Art Deco era but were combined with newer techniques now available through mass production. New stone cuts were devised such as emerald cuts, marquises, and pear shapes. Platinum was used more abundantly.

Deco jewelry is often bold and angular - forming geometrical shapes. Wildly colorful pieces were common, but in addition to these, were ones made using just two colors, perhaps black and white. Women again wore multiples of everything; rings, bracelets, necklaces, but in ways that were different from the past. In addition to precious stones, jewelry was made of paste, coral, crystal, and onyx. Sometimes the precious and non-precious stones were used side-by-side to create looks uniquely "Art Deco".

Long strands of beads and pendants were worn hanging to the waist. Ropes of pearls or beads could be knotted at the neck and reach to the thigh or worn with the length in back - calling attention to a plunging dress back. Lavalieres were still popular and lovely pendants were being made in precious and costume materials.

Bangle bracelets (often worn pushed high up on the arm), and straight-line bracelets (singly or in multiples) were the rage. Again, these can be found as fine jewelry as well as costume pieces.

An innovation of the Deco era was the Duette or Double-clip brooch. With these, a variety of looks could be created with one piece of jewelry. They could be worn as a single brooch or taken apart to wear as two pieces. Worn on the lapels of a jacket, a gown's plunging back, a belt, hat - they could be worn in a number of imaginative ways. Duettes can be found both in costume and fine jewelry pieces.

Jabot pins, items that are to be threaded through fabric, came into fashion. They're made to resemble stickpins but have a decorative end piece to affix over the point. They were worn on hats, belts, or suit lapels.

The style for earrings was for long drops. These worked well to accent short hair and straight lines of dress.

A style typical of the Art Deco era are objects with Pave' set stones. With these, very little of an object's surface is visible, covered as it is in stones, whether precious or fake.

Now that women were emancipated, they demanded that their new accessories be properly fashionable. Cigarette holders, compacts, lipstick cases, and evening bags had to be as richly ornamented and were sometimes works of art, in their own right. Many high-end pieces were made in jewel-toned enamels and studded with gems. Less expensive pieces were made of rhodium (pretending to be platinum) and accented with paste or rhinestones.

Men accessorized with cufflinks, tie bars and tiepins. While the styles were usually simpler in ornamentation than a similar woman's object, they showed the same artistic style and beauty. Money clips could be made of white gold with simple engraved lines and perhaps, studded with a single cabochon-cut gemstone. Tie bars were starting to replace stickpins. With smoking so popular, a man could have a beautifully made cigar cutter or lighter in his pocket.

Costume jewelry in the 1920's and 30's was available in all kinds of material - paste, faux gems, horn, bone, and celluloid, and all were mass-produced. CoCo Chanel and Schiaperelli, two major designers of the era, had a major influence on costume jewelry. Schiaperelli was famous for her outrageous surreal designs in bright colors and she sometimes worked with the artist Salvador Dali. CoCo Chanel made it fashionable to wear obviously fake, oversized pearls. It was during this era that cultured pearls first became available and between this innovation and the acceptance of fakes, the value of natural pearls plummeted. The woman on the street could now sport long ropes of Pearls, a look once available only to the very rich.

Rudolph Valentino, the film star, helped create popular interest in wristwatches. Made in white gold, yellow gold, or platinum, they were often accented with pave' diamonds, triangular cut sapphires, other cuts of gemstones, or enamel. Pocket watches were on their way out. Woman who didn't want to wear a wristwatch could opt for a pendant watch, sometimes beautifully enameled and gem set.

Bakelite was a staple for Art Deco costume pieces. It's an early form of plastic that can be molded and carved. All sorts of jewelry can be found; some pseudo-serious, some very whimsical - like necklaces of fruit or cartoon-like brooches.

A renewed interest in ancient Egyptian designs was influenced by the discovery of the tomb of Tutankhamen in 1922. The tomb was more intact than any previously discovered and contained fabulous items including jewelry worn by the boy-king, himself. The stories of a mummy's curse added to the mystique. As in Victorian times, designs of sphinxes, cobras, winged goddesses, pharaohs, and scarabs were wildly popular in fine and costume jewelry.

Platinum and white gold was used extensively in fine jewelry. In costume jewelry, Rhodium plating was used instead of these expensive metals and is easy to spot since it lacks the warmth and patina of the precious metals and has a "harder" look. It's difficult to find pieces that don't show wear.

World War II was the beginning of the end of Art Deco style. Life seemed precarious as invasions and bombings blanketed news broadcasts. Luxurious fabrics and precious metals were hard to come by in a world of shortages, rationing, and fear.