Jablonec Fashion Jewellery – Medals – Plaques – Badges

The embossing plants, pressing plants, and mints have always been inseparably linked with Jablonec, as well as with the art industry, metal engraving craft, girdlery, numismatics, and phaleristics. The products of these specific establishments are an integral part of our cultural history and everyday life today, and their range of products occupies a wide portfolio. Many were, or still are, produced either for purely collector's purposes or as a means of thesaurisation, hundreds of thousands of them served as part of the local fashion industry, others contributed to the appreciation of human achievement in political, religious or leisure activities, and a large number were intended for purely practical use. The proof coinages and blanks from the Jablonec region still reach the domestic market as semi-finished and finished products but are also export goods. The texts published so far on the topic of Jablonec embossing and pressing plants are only partial inputs and testimonies, which deal with the issue either from an economic, locally patriotic, or technological perspective. Therefore, the publication Embossed into Metal aims to cover the topic of pressed and embossed production of Jablonec craftsmen and companies in the broader context of cultural history, not only from the perspectives, but of course also from an aesthetic point of view. This includes both the specific types of products and their design, as well as the actual technique and technology of production, including the important and specialised professions of the craftsmen. Another aim of this detailed treatment of the subject is to refute incorrect information about the Jablonec embossing and pressing plants from before and after the Second World War and to provide as accurate a description as possible based on the available historical sources.

The book Embossed into Metal is grounded on surviving archival materials related to the activities of individual companies, national enterprises, or cooperatives. The book was also based on the reflection of contemporary publications and periodicals, company printed materials, advertisements, and critically evaluated testimonies of witnesses from the ranks of experts in fashion jewellery, haberdashery, numismatics, phaleristics, and technical production. The surviving objects from the Collection of the Museum of Glass and Jewellery in Jablonec nad Nisou, objects from the collections of other public institutions in the Czech Republic, and materials from specialised private collections were also important sources. An inseparable part of the research activity and understanding of the context of the studied material was the prospection of individual shops and warehouses of original tools, including the preserved exteriors, interiors, and historical machinery of these specialized workshops.

The publication should thus provide a more comprehensive overview of this phenomenon to other researchers, collectors, students, and other interested groups from the professional and general public, and also contribute to expanding knowledge about specific items from the Collection of the Museum of Glass and Jewellery in Jablonec nad Nisou.