drastically for a while (Gablonz 1896, pp. 86, 87). Around the turn of the Century the 
trimmings industry was an important branch of the production of the glass notions industry 
in the Isergebirge, as Winter and Tayenthal report: 
“The category, passementerie-stones, includes all the different colored stones but mostly those 
made of black glass, whlch are worked into hat Ornaments and passementeries, also mostly 
used for adorning fancy clothes... their shape is manifold: perforated press-molded beads 
(‘Flüssel’), hexagonals, squares, stars, pointed ovals, pendants, crosses, clover leaves, arrows 
and hundreds of other figures and shapes, whlch understandably do not fit into specific terms, 
are molded over an oil lamp in the sizes from 1 'h to 6 lines in the press-molding works at Labau, 
Pintschei, Gistei, Schwarzbrunn, etc., in small-scale industries, and in the Czech villages of the 
Semiler and Turnau districts in cottage industries. We are talking here about two different kinds of 
industry employing a total of some 3,000 male and female workers (press-molders, threaders, 
assemblers) in the trimmings industry: with the small-scale industry and the cottage industry...” 
(Winter 1900, p.13). 
“A second group working in non-precious metals, are the ‘Gürtler’ in the towns of Kukan, Seiden 
schwanz, Neudorf, Labau, Marschowitz, Dalleschitz, Puletschnei, Reichenau and Radi, south 
and southeast of Gablonz, also in Schlag, Morchenstern, Ober-Tannwald, Albrechtsdorf and 
Georgenthal, east of Gablonz. Here mostly the lesser articles of the trade are made, namely hat 
Ornaments, jet and the like, the so-called black-work. This industry was brought to the Iserge 
birge about 20 years ago by a Tannwald glasswares producer from Thüringen and with time, was 
perfected. In this branch, there are only a little more than 100tax-paying masters with about 
250journeymen and about 90 apprentices. In addition there is a fair number of unregistered 
handicrafts industries of the smallest category and numerous cottage industries. Altogether there 
are about 1,000 people working in this branch ...In addition, a series of small black glass articles 
which are chiefly used as stones in the passementerie industry are made especially by lamp- 
molding and in only a few press-molding works besides... Their sales are fairly constant and 
they have a steady acceptance in the passementerie industry of the Erzgebirge, as well as in 
those from Vienna and Paris and, when black hat Ornaments are in fashion, in the hat Ornament 
industry in the area itself...” (Tayenthal 1900, pp. 14,19). 
At the German-Bohemian Exhibition in Reichenberg “black glass” was represented with a 
few special items: 
“The jet-wares, modern women’s jewelry in black glass, made by Feix Brothers in Albrechtsdorf 
and by Josef Ullmann in Morchenstern have a charm of their own ...No less than 2,060 little 
stones were used for one feather-shaped piece of jewelry, and one necklace is put together from 
5,858 stones. These filigree-like pieces are built up on delicate wire frames and quiver at the 
slightest touch ... just to show the heights the skill reaches; a button the size of a 20 heller coin, 
cut in 300 facets, gives us an idea of this as well” (Schindler 1906, Centralblatt, p. 1721). 
“The black beads on exhibition, finely cut, up to 5 cm large, in the widest variety of shapes, with 
one or two holes are used for hat Ornaments...” (Arnold 1909, p. 90). 
“A special kind of raw glass on exhibition are the hollow, thin-walled glass spheres, of which only 
the fragments are used. They get their desired shape by cutting with the diamond or by being 
worked with the grinding wheel. The proper curvature is achieved by heating the piece on a clay 
mold so that it bends and takes on the desired curvature. Products made of black spherical glass 
by Feix Brothers, Albrechtsdorf, and Josef Ullmann, Morchenstern, are exhibited: brooches, 
combs, clasps, buckles, hat Ornaments of all kinds, etc., including numerous pieces of highly 
skilled work. All the pieces are made up of finely cut, small stones for soldering and bent and 
finely cut spherical glass pieces” (Arnold 1909, p. 92). 
Today jet bijouterie is usually equated with mourning jewelry; this is not true to the degree of 
exclusivity, although the “mourning jewelry made of mat and shiny black glass” (Winter 
1900, p. 139) did indeed achieve an importance of its own. 
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