Jewelry Inspired by Anne Brontë

Credit: Brontë Parsonage Museum

Yes, it's another Brontë post--but stay with me here. The Brontë Parsonage Museum recently announced a line of jewelry inspired by Anne Brontë, the youngest of those literary sisters. Designed by North Yorkshire-based artist Lindsey Tyson, the necklaces, pins, and brooches, available for $33 each, are fashioned with a printed felt pebble tucked inside a limpit shell plucked from Scarborough beach, the seaside community beloved by Anne and where she was buried after losing her battle with tuberculosis at the age of 29. (Anne is the only Brontë not interred at the family compound in Haworth.) The phrase "take courage" on one of the necklaces is inspired by Anne's last words, uttered to her sister Charlotte, while another one include snippets from Anne's novel. (If Charlotte is more to your literary taste, there are rings and earrings inspired by her work as well.)

It's turning out to be a big year for the youngest Bronte: 2020 is the 200th anniversary of her birth, and the Parsonage is hosting a major exhibition. A recent art exhibition dedicated to her and a reissue of her radical novel, The Tenant of Wildfell Hall, are also helping readers rediscover this "forgotten" sister.