Guiliano could even have worked on this necklace, for the Italian designer was intermittently employed by Phillips in London.
Composed of a series of palmette-shaped drops applied with granular detail and suspended from gold batons to a double-row foxtail chain, the necklace was consigned
privately, in its original case, to Hamptons (15 per cent buyer’s premium) for sale at Godalming on March 13.
This sort of necklace usually fetches between £7000-10,000 and, with a come-hither estimate of £2000-3000, this example was contested to £7800 by the trade.
Feathers help necklace to take off
THE Prince of Wales feathers to this Victorian gold fringe necklace, right, revealed that it was manufactured by Robert Phillips of Cockspur Street, London, whose signature the royal feathers were, but it may as well have been the work of any number of designers working in the Etruscan Revival style during this period – Carlo Giuliano, John Brogden or Augusta Castellani.
