I recently realized that I was a collector of buttons. Like that of all my collectibles, I don't start out collecting items, I just end up with a collection of items. So I figured, since I have a relatively large collection of sewing buttons and sewing notions....I decided to do some research and write about them. Let me start by mentioning my latest button find. My husband and I stopped at a yard sale and discovered some "NOH" buttons (will get into that later). We purchased the buttons for a couple of bucks....but when the seller realized that I was a button collector, she ask me to wait. She went inside and got a book on buttons and said that I could have it, but not just any book but a rare 1981 first edition of "The Big Book of Buttons" By Elizabeth Hughes and Marion Lester. If you are a serious collector of sewing buttons, then you know that this is the Bible of button book that every button enthusiast wants. There are so many giving people in the world and I have been blessed to meet a lot of them. That's what this is all about....Vintage Blessing.

People have been saving buttons for as long as they have been wearing garments. The early buttons were mainly used for ornamentation-like jewelry-on clothes that fastened with ties or pins. Button-like objects, some of them toggles, have been found in ancient sites and tombs around the world. The button-like ornaments were made of stone, pottery, ivory, jade, jet, bone, bronze, silver and gold. Written references date back only to the 13th century. In the 18th, 19th, and early 20th century, the beautiful decorative buttons were designed for the wealthy or the aristocratic. Carved jet cloak buttons of conical form have been found in Early to Middle Bronze Age Britain. Fastening the cloak with a button was the fashion prevalent in and around the Mediterranean, but about 1000 B.C. the British began to adopt the Northern European custom of fastening their cloaks with an elaborate pin or brooch. The role of the button as a decorative fastener remained more or less static over the next two millenia, then as garments became more form-fitting, the button became a more prominent decorative feature.

 Although buttons have been save since people started wearing clothes....it wasn't until the 1860's when young American women began to put together "charm strings" of at least 999 buttons. One type of button that was used on the strings is called a Tingue, after New York business man and one time state senator John H. Tingue, who challenged three acquaintances to make a string of 2,500 buttons in 30 days, for a reward of $50. They did better creating one of 2,700.

Several newspapers printed confusing articles about Tingue's offer, indicating the reward would be given to any young women-not just Tingue's three friends-who met the requirement. Tingue was flooded with button -around 90,000-of painted tin, cameo, mother-of-pearl, pewter, brass and glass on 33 strings. One string weighed 14 pounds. The strings eventually ended up in the Connecticut State Museum, where many decades later, collectors sorting through them noticed that one type of button-glass decorated with a piece of foil-appeared on many examples; since then this type has come to be called the Tingue. Tingues are only one among many kinds of buttons that have been made over the centuries-and sought after today by collectors.

People collect buttons for different reasons. I collect them for, well, let's just say I collect them. Most people collect the rarest, some collect the prettiest, some collect because of color....because there is so many shapes, sizes, colors, materials, we have a lot of reasons, why, to choose from.

Buttons can be made of: bone, ivory, horn, tortoise shell, ceramic, enamel, hard rubber, celluloid, vegetable ivory, plastic, fabric, velvet background, black glass, glass, watch crystal, metal, brass, bronze, silver, gold, pewter, mother-of-pearl, wood. This is to name a few.

 NOH MASKS PORTRAYED ON 20TH CENTURY ARITA PORCELAIN BUTTONS. THE WORK IS VERY FINE. THE NOH PLAYS ARE TRADITIONAL JAPANESE THEATRE, ONLY MEN PERFORM AND CARVED MASKS ARE WORN TO OBSCURE FACIAL EXPRESSION SINCE EMOTIONS ARE ARE CONVEYED BY GESTERS AND POSES.

This article is probably just part I, because button collecting is so extensive. Meanwhile stay tuned.