Ornaments, Furniture and Jewels – Julian Rees (2013)

I was not too impressed with the previous two books of Rees that I reviewed. They make nice reads, but not much more than that. The current title is more like Rees’ wonderful (and similar) book about tracing boards (2015). Like all other titles is not not a thick book, but like the tracing boards book, Ornaments… is a big size (almost A4) book with many images and text.

Rees uses the term “jewels” in another way as you may expect. The book is not about the jewels of the officers or ‘Masonic bling’, but rather about the entire furnishings of a lodge room. Each subject is nicely elucidated making references between different systems such as the Emulation rituals, the workings of the British federation of Le Droit Humain (I guess he must have transferred around this time), but also to French or German workings.

Just as with the tracing boards book, this not only teaches you about symbolism, but also about the rituals and this combination seems to be what Rees is best at.

2013 Lewis Masonic, isbn 0853184127