Holding Hands

One of the most beautiful innovations of art nouveau design occurs when an artist translates the relationships between animals and plants into a piece of jewelry: one flower petal leaning over to touch another, birds in an embrace. The relationship is then formed not only into art, but also into function. Here are two combs, which illustrate this beautifully.

On the left is a pair of fan-shaped leaves by Louis Aucoc, c.1900. They are made of green plique-à-jour enamel with small rose-cut diamonds in the veins. It sold for $32,400 on April 25, 2006, in New York. On the right, two silver cranes embrace to make this imaginative comb by Hugue. As you can see, the legs of the crane function as the comb, which sold for 1200 GBP on February 22, 2006 in London. Both came from Sothebys.