On page 83 of July’s Harper’s Bazaar, Sen­a­tor John McCain and his wife, Cindy, pose for a Grant Wood-esqe por­trait and it was not McCain’s pitch­fork and pol­i­tics that drew my attention–it was the two lush and large cameos sit­ting on Mrs. McCain’s right shoul­der. Those brooches were a very smart choice for the quin­tes­sen­tial image a pres­i­den­tial candidate’s wife. They are a quiet lux­ury, the value of which can nei­ther be read­ily deter­mined nor assessed by mere obser­va­tion and they are fault­less because cameos are the type of jewel that do not roar but have instead rather a sound­less dynamic much like a paint­ing or sculp­ture. Basi­cally, they cast a kind of intel­lec­tual refine­ment upon the wearer.

The carv­ing in a cameo offers an entirely dif­fer­ent per­spec­tive from that of a gem­stone. The qual­ity and beauty of for­mer is attrib­uted to the skill of the arti­san while the lat­ter is nature’s artistry. Cameos are worked in many nat­ural mate­ri­als: shell, stone, lava, glass, gutta– per­cha (vul­can­ized rub­ber) and jet. The last two sub­stances were com­monly used dur­ing the Vic­to­rian period when darkly col­ored mourn­ing jew­elry was a daily part of a woman’s wardrobe.

Just to add a bit advice for those mak­ing the BIG com­mit­ment this month: wear­ing a cameo on your wed­ding day is such a lovely and lyri­cal way to adorn your gown. The col­or­ing of a shell cameo enhances your com­plex­ion and works with nearly every color of the rain­bow. I wore one when I mar­ried (it was my Grandmother’s) and received com­pli­ments about it all day long. Dia­monds or their imi­ta­tion coun­ter­parts are impor­tant to draw atten­tion to your face on this spe­cial day, how­ever pair­ing them with a cameo adds a soft, poetic dimension.

Below are some won­der­ful exam­ples pho­tographed by Mar­cia Moy­lan and Jacque­line Smelkin­son of Spare Room Antiques in Bal­ti­more, Maryland.