Mourning Jewelry

The mourning scene is composed entirely from human hair on milk glass. It contains all the standard elements: weeping willow, tomb, idyllic setting, flowers, and painted in the background sunset yellow, orange, and pink streak across the horizon.  Strand upon strand was layered to create a three dimensional effect and finely chopped hair added last to give the scene greater depth and scale. These three dimensional hairwork pieces are exceptionally rare, and this one probably dates to the mid nineteenth century.

Image and text source webring.org

Above image from Millers Antique Guide.