Yellow and Clear Gemstone Beaded Necklace with Focal Bead
"Sunshine" Necklace
Hawthorne's The Marble Faun depicts the fall of the character Donatello from a simple, Golden-Age innocence to anguished guilt. Donatello retreats to his ancestral home and, when his good friend Kenyon visits, serves a wine made from grapes grown in the family vineyard. That wine is called Sunshine.
The friends' conversation reveals that Sunshine is exclusive to Donatello's family estate; it can be produced and, indeed, appreciated nowhere else. Moreover, its distinctive charms are fragile and fleeting, and it must be enjoyed as soon as it is poured.
Wear this necklace as a reminder of the virtues you find only among your family or in whatever place you consider home. Or wear it to recall, throughout the day, the importance of enjoying small, special pleasures as they happen.
The necklace's design pays tribute to the "Sunshine" chapter of the novel in some very particular ways. The rock-crystal beads' transparency suggests the clarity of both the wine and the glasses in which it's served, and the focal bead was chosen for its shape, reminiscent of a wineglass's bowl. The citrine beads range in color from lighter to deep golden yellows, and their varying degrees of transparency mimic the alterations in Donatello's Sunshine over the course of the friends' refreshment. Some beads are cut and polished smooth; others are step-cut or faceted so that light plays over them in different ways. The small, faceted wood beads offer contrasting color, opacity, and a touch of earthiness.
The Details
- length: 18 5/8 inches
- dimensions of focal bead: approximately 29x22mm
- diameter of toggle clasp: 15mm
- gold-filled components: wire protectors; clasp
- other findings: sterling-silver crimp beads; gold-plated crimp covers
