The annual jeweled ornament from the U.S. Capitol Historical Society puts the Capitol dome at the center, framed in fine gold etching that picks up the building's columns and the patterned Minton tilework from its historic corridors. A crystal sits above the Statue of Freedom at the top.
Patriotic color and holly branches fill out the rest of the design. It carries the polish of a piece meant to stay in a collection, which is why the annual jeweled editions keep turning up on the same trees year after year.
Beacon Design made this one in the United States. They are a veteran-founded company.
Details:
- Gold etching of the Capitol dome, columns, and Minton tile patterns
- Crystal accent above the Statue of Freedom
- Patriotic enamel color with holly branch detailing
- Made in America by Beacon Design, a veteran-founded company
Did you know?
The Statue of Freedom crowning the dome stands 19 feet 6 inches tall and was cast in five sections at Clark Mills's foundry outside Washington starting in 1860. When the foreman in charge of the casting walked off the job over wages in 1859, Mills handed the work to Philip Reid, an enslaved artisan in his shop, who figured out how to separate the plaster model and then oversaw the bronze casting. Reid was freed on April 16, 1862, when the District of Columbia Compensated Emancipation Act took effect. The final section of the statue was bolted into place on December 2, 1863, thirteen days after Lincoln delivered the Gettysburg Address, to a 35-gun salute answered by the forts ringing the city. Reid was a free man that day. The crystal on this ornament sits right above her.