The Wearable Handmade Ceramics of Carol Halmy Jewelry
Handmade bisque porcelain defined Carol Halmy’s 1980s jewelry—now an overlooked and affordable collectible
Occasionally, I like to highlight jewelry brands and/or creative individuals you’ve probably never heard of, and sometimes they’re ones I discovered firsthand back when I was a stylish young woman. Carol Halmy is a person and a brand that fits this description perfectly.
This goes back to the 1980s, a few years before I became a collector of vintage jewelry. Adornment was about completing an outfit at that time, and some of those looks involved animal prints or textured fabrics that just worked well with fashionable jungle motif jewelry. Lucky for me, I got a job working adjacent to the Houston Galleria, and I could walk over and shop on my lunch hour. Also fortuitous was the fact that the store Accessory Lady carried Carol Halmy jewelry, and I was a frequent shopper there.
I purchased a necklace, which I still own, featuring a larger tiger and a cub made of hand-painted bisque porcelain. Back then, I never really wondered who Halmy was, where her business was located, or if she painted all the jewelry I saw on display herself. As I began looking for answers to those questions more recently, I realized that not much had been documented about this enterprising woman’s business. I decided to do some research, and here’s what I found out.
Carol Halmy’s Jewelry
Making jewelry started as a hobby for Halmy, but she saw the opportunity to turn it into a small New York-based jewelry studio established in 1976. Newspapers were featuring some of her first designs in the late 1970s. Those were porcelain pendants with a flat surface decorated with hand-painted tigers. Around that time, Halmy is also mentioned as an artist whose work was presented in person by Magda K (another jewelry-related name you might recognize from the ‘80s) at several stores, including Neiman Marcus. This includes calla lily and poppy pendants on cords.
By 1981, molded ceramic jungle animals made in the Halmy studio were being featured by many different stores, and those promos continued through the mid-1990s. Since they were sold for a long period, these are the Carol Halmy designs I run across now more than any others. In addition to big cats, other animals, such as zebras, giraffes, and elephants, were part of the line, too. Plain round and oval earrings painted to match Halmy necklaces and brooches were also being made.
A few years into the ‘80s, ads show fashionable black and white jewelry with geometric designs painted on ovals and rounds attached to black leather cords. I’ve run across these styles in earthy colors as well. Later in the ‘80s, more intricate handmade ceramic flower necklaces in a variety of colors were sold through department stores like Macy’s. The styles changed a bit over the years, but ceramic materials were the common denominator among all this jewelry.
As you can imagine, one person couldn’t keep up with the demand when large retailers and boutiques around the country were placing orders. Online sources show that Halmy employed about six people, although that number may have been higher at some point. This makes sense when side-by-side comparisons are made; the animals, flowers, and geometric designs don’t look like they were all painted by the same individual. I tend to look for examples with the best detailing and artistry if I buy one for my collection or for resale. That makes hunting them down a little more fun and challenging because some speak to me more than others.
In addition to being sold in catalogs like Gump’s and Horchow, Halmy’s jewelry was also featured in trunk shows at boutiques around the country in the ‘90s. Interestingly, one 1998 marketing piece mentioned that Halmy was taking orders for custom-made jewelry featuring pets. In addition to jewelry, Halmy also marketed a line of trinket boxes. Like the adornment, these are decorated with an array of animals, including kitties and dogs, and seem to have been sold primarily in the late 1990s.
Halmy’s business was mentioned in periodicals as late as 1999, when she and her husband were marketing through booths set up at festivals in the Northeastern United States. That’s where the research trail runs cold.
Identifying Halmy Jewelry
Most Carol Halmy jewelry is made using hand-painted bisque porcelain. Some of the early pendants are signed Carol Halmy on the front. Other pieces are signed C Halmy in black cursive writing on the back, and many have a gold foil sticker that reads “Hand Made Porcelain by Carol Halmy.” Some pieces were only marked with gold foil stickers, so if they’ve been removed, the piece will be unmarked.
Earrings were sold on Carol Halmy hang cards, so they, too, are unmarked. Some of those can be rather nondescript, but many of the animal and flower pieces do have distinguishing characteristics you can learn to recognize by studying the jewelry in hand and through photographs in the online marketplace.
How Much Is It Worth
One of the great things about collecting Carol Halmy jewelry is the price–you can put together a sweet collection without completely emptying your bank account. Most of the brooches sell for less than $30 each, and necklaces usually range from around $30-$50 in the resale marketplace.
One thing I find amazing when looking back at periodical advertising is that some of the necklaces originally sold for $35-$60, so the prices are much the same now as they were when they were new. Of course, a retail price of $60 then equates to $200 adjusted for inflation today, so as a young career woman, buying my tiger necklace likely felt like a splurge. Most of the animal pins sold for $15–$20 when they were new, and you find more of those available now in comparison to necklaces.
Some ceramic jewelry from the 1980s has grown in popularity over the past decade, and prices have risen concurrently. This brand is still affordable right now, so if you like it, you might want to consider picking up a few pieces on the cheap before an influencer somewhere starts driving up the values.
Pamela Wiggins Siegel has been buying, selling, and collecting costume jewelry for more than 30 years. She is the author of Warman’s Costume Jewelry (Krause Publications) and the co-founder of Costume Jewelry Collectors Int’l, an organization dedicated to hosting events and providing educational resources for collectors. Visit her online at www.chicantiques.com and www.cjci.co.
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