Clasp

Mrs Anne Hull Grundy donated a large collection of jewellery to Birmingham Museum & Art Gallery. This was one of a number of donations she made to museums in this country. She was concerned that each collection she gave to a museum should suit its manufacturing history and existing collection, but she also wished to donate examples of work not already represented in our collections. This silver brooch has been placed in a sulphur solution to blacken it, then polished to take the sulphur blackening off the high parts of the brooch. This process is called ‘oxidisation’; it is often used to give depth and contrast to three-dimensional silverwork.