The stomacher, known in French as the devant-de-corsage (literally "front of the bodice"), is a large jewelled ornament worn at the centre front of a dress or bodice. Produced by Cartier extensively between roughly 1895 and 1915, the stomacher represents one of the most materially substantial objects in the firm's Belle Époque output: a single piece might span much of the front of a bodice and contain hundreds of individual stones in an intricate openwork setting.
Form and Materials
The typical Cartier stomacher from this period is executed in platinum and diamonds, with the openwork garland style of scrolls, festoons, ribbons, and pendant drops that defined the firm's approach to fine jewellery in the years around 1900. Millegrain borders secure the stones within their settings and give the metalwork a fine textile quality at close range. The overall effect, when worn against dress fabric, is of a large, coherent architectural structure that moves as a single plane but reveals its complexity in detail.
The scale of the form required both technical ambition and access to significant stones. The central element of a stomacher is typically a large single diamond or coloured stone, around which the surrounding scrollwork is organised. The quality of the central stone often determined the visual character of the whole piece.
Cartier's Stomacher Output
Cartier produced stomachers across the Belle Époque and Edwardian periods, supplying them to the aristocratic and wealthy clients who wore formal court dress requiring substantial jewellery at functions where dress codes placed specific expectations on ornament. The form suited the fashion silhouettes of the period, in which the front of a dress offered a large flat plane well suited to a substantial centrepiece ornament.
A recurring feature of Cartier's stomacher design is convertibility: the ability to detach sections of the piece and wear them independently. A central brooch might be removable; pendant drops might detach; the whole could be divided into smaller elements that could be worn in the hair, pinned to a shoulder, or used as separate brooches. This flexibility extended the practical life of objects that might otherwise have been too formally specific for everyday use.
Notable Examples
A 1912 Cartier stomacher centred on a 34.08 carat pear-shaped diamond, originally owned by South African magnate Solly Joel, sold at Christie's New York in June 2019 for $10.6 million. The Joel stomacher is one of the better-documented pieces in this category, appearing in scholarship on both Cartier and the Joel family's collecting history.
A 1906 stomacher that belonged to Mary Scott Townsend has also been documented.
Decline of the Form
The stomacher declined after the First World War. Dress silhouettes changed substantially in the 1920s, moving away from the structured, heavily ornamented forms of the Edwardian period toward simpler, less architecturally demanding styles. The formal court occasions that had created demand for very large bodice ornaments became less central to the social calendar, and the surviving stomachers passed into collections and salesrooms rather than into continuous use. The Art Deco aesthetic that came to define Cartier's work in the 1920s called for a different kind of ornament entirely.
Sources
- Francesca Cartier Brickell, The Cartiers (Ballantine Books, 2019)
- Hans Nadelhoffer, Cartier: Jewelers Extraordinary (Thames and Hudson, 1984; revised 2007), pp. 42, 70 et al.
- Christie's, Maharajas & Mughal Magnificence, New York, 19 June 2019: Joel stomacher, 34.08ct pear diamond devant-de-corsage
