1930's Yellow Flowers Pot Metal Brooch

The term "Pot Metal" came about because of industrial factories practise during the first half of the 20th century of gathering up their metal scraps from the manufacturing process and melting it all in to one pot. So you often had a variety of metals in the one pot like zinc, copper, lead, tin, aluminium - all inexpensive to re cast. Other more precious metals were required for the war effort. Both the USA and the UK produced a wide variety of pot metal jewellery. This lovely example is from the USA, quite substantial in size at 10cm x 4.5cm. It is in very good condition considering its age with bright yellow flowers, green enamelled leaves and leaves set with tiny rhinestones.  Gift boxed by Vintageonline.