VintageUndertheSea Shop Owner & Curator/Collector

Gay Sherman Weintz runs her shop, VintageUndertheSea, on Etsy, and shares her collection of carefully selected vintage and antique jewelry. Magazine advertisement and patented pieces are a specialty, as well as Christmas tree pins, Art Deco/Art Nouveau, and 1960's jewelry. Other favorites are chandelier earrings, cocktail rings, stunning brooches and couture statement necklaces, not to mention whatever outstanding and unique pieces catch her trained eye.

Gay's first passion was Christmas tree pins! With these beauties, you can revel in the holiday spirit any time of the year. Ahh, the exquisite designs of Cadoro, Vero, Stanley Hagler, DeNicola, Lea Stein, Corocraft, Laguna, Beatrix, Lianna (Lia), ART, Gem-Craft, Warner, and Weiss....and so many more amazing designers, as well as spectacular, unsigned beauties, create Gay's collection that is purported to be among the best in the world, as well as already having been published in two discerning collector books (and Gay's own book is in the making!).

To quote a November 28, 2012 article (Shore Publishing, by Rita Christopher) about Gay's history:

"Gay herself first became fascinated by costume jewelry as a child, by looking at and coveting the gorgeous pieces her mother had collected. She traces her fascination with Christmas tree pins to a gift of just such a pin that she gave her next-door neighbor, Reverend Timothy Haut of the Deep River Congregational Church, when she was in 4th grade. Haut wore the pin on his lapel at the church's famed Christmas pageant.

'Seeing him in the spotlight with the Christmas tree pin, I was just incredibly touched,' she recalls." End quote.

Gay's other passion is vintage 1960's jewelry, and she is an avid follower of AMC TV's Mad Men show. Her Pinterest page (Vintagevamp1) board is devoted to revealing all the designers of every piece worn by the female characters (from Seasons 1-7). She worked with Janie Bryant and provided jewelry for the sixth and seventh seasons of Mad Men!

Additionally, one of Gay's 1970s vintage, signed Trifari bracelets wraps around Jennifer Anniston's wrist in the 2014 release movie "Life of Crime", based on the Elmore Leonard novel, "The Switch", also starring actor Tim Robbins (of "The Shawshank Redemption" movie fame).

Gay is well educated in the various costume designers of the 1920's to the 1980's. Her favorite designers are Schiaparelli, Vendome (Coro/Corocraft), Weiss, Sphinx of England, Trifari (Alfred Philippe), Accessocraft, ART signed bracelets, Boucher, Hattie Carnegie, Castlecliff, Alice Caviness, Eisenberg Original, Har, and Napier (Art Deco era-1970's), plus glass, crystal and sterling silver pieces from the Art Deco period, Art Nouveau and select Victorian rarities, as well as unusual and scarce sterling silver and 14K gold simple & mechanical charms for charm bracelets.

Gay continually lists pieces from her personal vintage jewelry collection of designer Christmas tree pins... (Some photographed in Jill Gallina's 3rd Edition book, "Christmas Pins Past & Present"), as well as unsigned beauties (Many featured in Kathy Flood's Christmas tree pin book, Volume 1). If you are looking for a particular tree or line of designer signed trees, please send convo her a message
Gay just might have exactly what you are seeking!

Check out Gay's Pinterest page: vintagevamp1. The following boards might be of interest to you: 1. Christmas Tree Pins, 2. Vintage Costume & Fine Jewelry, 3. Napier of Connecticut, 4. Mad Men Costume Jewelry Designers Revealed!, 5. Vendome Vintage Mag Ads, and more! Look also for coming attractions and new additions posted on a monthly basis.

Also, Gay's Facebook page gives you the heads up on coming attractions, too, as well as upcoming events, shows, and invitation-only vintage/antique jewelry, vintage clothing, and accessory parties...search for "Vintage Under the Sea" on Facebook.

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Gay's WordPress blog features periodic articles of interest to vintage/antique jewelry collectors, fashionistas and and to those who would enjoy reading about the history of costume jewelry. This history is a phenomena (1935-1970's) of thousands of patented works of art, created largely by some very talented fine jewelry artisans and craftsmen, who were made redundant in the precious jewelry industry following the Great Depression. These designers therefore left Europe (e.g., Cartier-trained Alfred Philippe & Marcel Boucher), emigrated to America, and moved across into the costume equivalent, taking their considerable skills with them.

These highly skilled, fine jewelry designer immigrants, among them the home-grown, Rhode Island School of Design graduate Gene Verrecchia, as well as an untold score of "unknown Michelangelo's", came together to create a very special history. These men and the women, even more unknown than their male counterparts, who toiled in small, cramped design studios, tucked away in the company giants' warehouses located in Providence, RI, put this city on the global stage as the costume jewelry capitol of the world.

Significantly, this was at a time when trend-setting clothes designers such as Coco Chanel, her rival Elsa Schiaparelli, and Hattie Carnegie were promoting the idea, for the first time, that it was “cool” to wear jewelry made from non-precious materials.

These circumstances that all came together like a "perfect storm" during that period of time will never, ever happen again...and therefore, we can only talk about and try to preserve what's left of that past miracle, when the costume jewelry that was created in those precious 35+ years were masterpieces of design, construction and quality, and are becoming rare and some incredibly scarce to find as the decades march forward. Many pieces are already extinct - physical examples of them have ceased to exist among the collections of the best treasure hunters worldwide. For these elusive "Dodos", we now only have the remains of some precious drawings and photographs.

Leading from the 1980's and forward, costume jewelry went the way of being mostly stamped out en masse in China, made and created from inferior materials, sloppy workmanship, and sadly bearing the very common mark of mostly ubiquitous designs. Sigh. Sniff.

Fear not, however, for you can regroup here and shop for these bygone beauties in the unparalleled collections hosted by Etsy online, with Gay's amazing treasure trove stockpile among them, usually more than 1,000 pieces strong!

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Finally, tune in to iCRVradio, live-streaming on the internet, for Gay's weekly Wednesday morning (10:30 EST) broadcast shows (now archived), alternating between "Antiques Trail" and "If This Brooch Could Talk", depending upon the season (Antiques Trail focuses mainly on new & annual vintage/antique shows & flea markets that happen in the summer & fall months).

Past guests on Gay's radio show include:
1. Jill Gallina - author of three editions of "Christmas Pins Past & Present", ID and price guide books, shared her tannenbaum stories and knowledge
2. Karen Ellman - owner of Vintage Virtuosa of Westport, CT - shared stories about celebrities and vintage jewelry with biz partner, Gay
3. Dynamic mother-daughter duo of Tova's Vintage in Old Saybrook, CT shared their knowledge, collection and passion for vintage/antique jewelry
4. Melinda Lewis (author of THE Napier book) called in from California and shared the stories of America's oldest costume jewelry company
5. Colleen Kinder - Chicago interior designer and TV personality, shared her passion and stories about vintage costume jewelry
6. Peter DiCristofaro - RI Costume Jewelry Museum's curator, will share the history and stories of how his museum came to be
7. Kathy Flood - Christmas tree pin guru, Chicago Tribune antiques/collectibles columnist, and author of at least five (5) Warman's costume jewelry guide books, will share MANY stories from her decades of expert experience
8. Janie Bryant - award-winning costume designer for TV shows and films...will talk about her work with Mad Men and new projects on the horizon
9. Mike Wolfe & Frank Fitz from "American Pickers" (History Channel wildly popular show)...will they show up picking again in our area and stop to chat?
10. Madeleine Albright - If Gay's lucky, she may be able to catch the attention of this former Secretary of State, who used many of these costume jewelry pieces as a diplomatic, political and social tool, written about in her highly acclaimed book, "Read My Pins: The Madeleine Albright Collection"...keep your fingers crossed!