Pair of clip-on chandelier earrings, multicolored wooden beads

Jewelry

-

Archive of Cuban Socialism

Name/Title

Pair of clip-on chandelier earrings, multicolored wooden beads

Entry/Object ID

2025.1.89

Description

A pair of clip-on chandelier (tassel/waterfall) earrings, each built from many small round wooden beads dyed in mixed colors — green, blue, teal, red, coral, brown, and natural/golden tones — strung on wire links. A clustered head of beads sits at the top, from which several dangling strands of beaded links hang free, giving a fringed waterfall effect. The fittings are gold-tone metal; the reverse shows a hinged clip-back (clip-on, not pierced) on a gold-tone plate, with the beaded strands wire-linked around it. The metal links and bead caps are a brassy gold tone. Two earrings, matched.

Item Type

Earrings - Pair

Context

From a FB comment: Me hace pensar en aretes que yo podía ver durante mi niñez en la segunda mitad de los 1970. Pienso en las creaciones que podían surgir en el llamado Mercado de Arte Popular, que funcionaba en la Plaza de la Catedral habanera desde 1979. Others date them from before: In FB: Una tia de mi madre tenía unos iguales, se fue de Cuba en el 72. Yo la vi en Miami en el 96 y se los ponia. O quizás eran una copia de los otros.. In WhatsApp: Toñi vi unos aretes de cuentas q pusiste una foto en FB no eran baratos.. En los años ( q yo recuerde ) 53- 57 mi tía tenía unos muy parecidos y otros de pequeñísimos trocitos de madera pintados de colores.. los recuerdo muy bien.

Collection

The Cabrera Arús family collection

Acquisition

Accession

2025.1

Made/Created

Notes

MAKER: Unknown; unmarked. No maker's mark visible. Costume jewelry; manufacturer not identified. DATE / PERIOD: Not marked; mid-to-late 20th century (estimated). Bold beaded wooden chandelier earrings of this kind suit the 1960s–1980s fashion for natural-material and ethnic-style jewelry, but nothing fixes a date; undetermined more precisely. ORIGIN: Not established from the object (no mark).

Materials

Material

Wood, Metal

Material Notes

MATERIALS: Dyed wooden beads (multicolored) on gold-tone base-metal wire links and eye-pins, with gold-tone clip findings. TECHNIQUES: Small wooden beads threaded on wire eye-pins and linked into a clustered head with hanging beaded fringes; mounted to a clip-back finding. Bead-and-wire-link construction; costume-jewelry assembly.

Condition

Overall Condition

Good

Relationships

Related Places

Place

City

Havana

Country

Cuba

Region

Caribbean, Central America

Notes

use

Research Notes

Notes

Wooden beaded jewelry of this kind was produced widely and in many places (including Latin American and Caribbean craft contexts), so the form does not localize or date it, and no maker or origin should be inferred from appearance.

Created By

María A. Cabrera Arús

Create Date

October 22, 2025

Updated By

María A. Cabrera Arús

Update Date

June 4, 2026