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Discover Mid-America - August 2004

Collectors putting money into old purses

It doesn’t matter whether you call it a pocketbook, handbag, portfolio, tie pocket or reticule, the purse has a long and colorful history. These days collectors call them expensive.

At a recent Skinner auction a c.1740-90 American needlework pocketbook sold for $10, 575. However, it was so beautifully made it could classify as an historical work of art. In fact for a long time many of the beadwork purses popular from the 1600s to the Victorian age are considered an art form. Purses made in the recent 20th century are considered collectibles to be worn or displayed. Prices for them can range from $50 to several hundred, depending on design, workmanship and maker.

Historically, the most elegant purses were those embroidered with heraldic or floral patterns in silver, gold and pearls on expensive silks. Made from the mid-to late-1700s, they are in museum collections.

Needlework pocketbook, America, c. 1740-90. (photo courtesy Skinner Auctions, Boston, MA)

Many techniques were used in making the beadwork bags in the 18th century. Colorful glass beads were popular and used to create unusual designs and translucent effects. They were sewn onto fabric and integrated into knitted or crocheted bags.

At that time, European travelers brought souvenir pocketbooks back from the Near East and Mediterranean. They were made of silk with silver-gilt embroidery in an envelope style. They are known as Constantinople pocketbooks. The name is embroidered along with a date. A century later, visitors to Niagara Falls brought back a similar style beaded bag often made by Native Americans.

By the end of the 18th century, fashionable travelers brought home delicate lace bags made from refined plant fiber. Motifs included exotic animals, flowers and berries.

Embroidered bags, made to give as gifts, were a custom from the eighteenth to nineteenth centuries. They often had embroidered inscriptions. Others were made by schoolgirls.

Victorian purses were as over-embellished as Victorian homes. They combined knitting, beading and crochet techniques with floral, geometric and exotic ethnic motifs in vivid and dark colors. Silver and gold accents were often added.

The 19th century carpetbag was a far cry from the small, decorative purses. Popular beginning in the mid-19th century, they were made of power-woven Brussels carpet. Patterns were generally floral. The smallest were 11” x 12 1/2”. By the 1870s, they were out of fashion.

In the 1920s and ‘30s metallic and beaded designs reflecting the motifs of the Art Deco era were fashionable evening bags.

Currently, handbags of every sort are catching collector’s eyes, even the Lucite horrors from the 1950s. In case you are too young to remember, they resembled translucent lunch boxes and were decorated with everything from plastic to rhinestones.

If you like the modern designs of the fifties, keep your eye out for the cloth and plastic bags with freeform designs typical of the era. Those designed by Emillio Pucci in silk and can cost several hundred dollars at Modernism shows. And, with Pucci retro designs back in fashion, the new bags can cost even more.

When men began carrying purses in the 1980s, it seemed a bit odd. Now they are mainstream. Yet, when men carried pocketbooks in the 19th century it was quite commonplace.

CLUES

When there was a revival of interest in Victorian mesh and beaded bags in the 1970s, they were reproduced, as were needlepoint examples. Heavily reproduced were Art Deco styles. Examine for signs of wear and nylon linings.

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