1960s Mid-Century Dark Pink Enamel Gold Tone Flower Modernist Brooch

This brooch was made in the 1960s in gold-tone metal decorated with red and dark pink enamel. Its design is a circular flower, measuring 3.7 by 3.7 cm, and it fastens with a pin and a roll-over clasp. It is unsigned. Flower brooches were among the most popular forms of costume jewellery in the mid-century decades, and this one shows how the motif was simplified in the modernist taste of the 1960s.

The 1960s brought brighter colour into fashion, and enamel brooches offered an easy way to add it. Pinks and reds were especially popular, worn against neutral coats, suits and knits. Costume jewellers produced flower brooches in many variations, from naturalistic to highly stylised, at prices that allowed women to own several.

Mid-century design favoured simple geometric forms and clear colour. Designers in many fields, from textiles to ceramics, reduced natural motifs to their essential shapes. A flower drawn as a circle with layered petals of enamel reflects that approach, bringing the language of modern design to a traditional subject.

The brooch uses red and dark pink enamel side by side, two close shades that give the flower depth without breaking its unity. The gold-tone metal outlines and separates the colours. The roll-over clasp secures the pin, a typical mid-century closure that prevents the brooch from opening accidentally.

Small enamel flower brooches from the 1960s are collected for their colour and design and are easy to wear today on a lapel, collar or scarf. In very good condition, this example keeps its enamel and clasp in good order.