Design 5105 Necklace

Design 5105 situates this necklace in the mature phase of Margot de Taxco's studio. The numbered design inventory she maintained throughout her working life assigned lower numbers to earlier work, as Morrill (1994, p. 15) records; a four-digit designation confirms a model produced well into the sustained arc of her production, after both her technique and her workshop had fully settled.

Vitreous enamel fused to sterling silver was the combination she made her name on. Morrill (1994, p. 166) documents that Margot perfected and developed the champlevé enamel-on-silver technique — first initiated in the Los Castillo workshop — into one of her major lines, and that her enamel necklaces were "glittering displays of color, texture, and technical perfection." Her workshop maintained a dedicated enamel operation under a master silversmith, reflecting how central the medium was to the studio's identity. The warmth of fired enamel against the brightness of sterling produced the chromatic presence that defined her jewelry across decades of work.

The design number stamped to the reverse anchors this piece within a catalogued body of work, distinguishing it from the unsigned enamel silver jewelry that circulates without reliable attribution and making it a useful reference point for the range of her catalog.