Suite of buttons, France, 1760-1790

Suite of buttons in the Victoria and Albert Museum, London (museum number T.47-2021), made in France, dated 1760-1790. The museum's brief description reads: Card with 12 buttons, green foil, mesh, and cast silver roundel, probably France, 1760-90.

Museum description: This is a suite of 12 buttons, most probably intended for a man's coat, which have never been used. Their shanks are pricked through a thick piece of paper and are tied to one another on the back with a piece of string. They are extremely rare survivals of luxurious French eighteenth-century sets of buttons, still mounted on cardboard. They therefore provide evidence of how such sets were put together for sale, and reveal the roots of a practice that continues into the twenty-first century.

Magnificent buttons were an important form of embellishment in the eighteenth century. They increased in size, number, variety and impact in Europe in accordance with changing French fashions, which were characterised before the French Revolution by a taste for conspicuous luxuries. Buttons made in luxury materials, such as gold, silver, precious jewels, and ivory added to a repertoire that already included fabric-covered, embroidered and passementerie buttons.

The most lavish and extravagant… The museum records it as metal, measuring Diameter 2 cm. These details come from the museum's own record; how far this object represents a wider collectible type has not yet been independently verified.