Casgliadau Arlein

Horse shoe shaped cardboard wedding charm covered with silver foil. Inscribed GOOD LUCK. Cream coloured artificial silk ribbon. Given to Beryl Jones who married James (Jim) Henry Hayes at 8:00am on 4 March 1950 at St David's Church, Fleur-de-lis. Beryl was very shy and decided to marry early in the morning to avoid attention. The couple met during the Second World War when Beryl was working on the sheet rolling mills at The Orb Works, Lysaght, Newport. Jim was home on leave and visiting his brothers and colleagues working at the factory.

Front and back of card is covered in silver foil. The foil is embossed with a design of leaves. In addition, the words 'GOOD LUCK' and rectangular 'nails' are imprinted onto the foil-covered card. The foil is marginally too small for the horse-shoe leaving a small sliver at the bottom edge uncovered (both front and back). The silver foil on the reverse of the horse shoe is embossed with a fine texture. Mirror images of the embossed elements are visible on the back. An 11mm wide, white synthetic ribbon bow is attached to the lower centre front. It is held in place with a metal staple. More of the same ribbon is attached in a V-shape to the back of the horse-shoe (attached with three staples: one at the centre of the 'U' shape and one on each upper end). A wider (21mm) white synthetic ribbon is attached to the back of the upper ends of the horse-shoe which serves as a hanging loop.

On either side of the horse-shoe is a five pointed leaf ornament embossed onto paper covered in silver foil. These are adhered to a stem made from wire wrapped in brown paper. Both this 'stem', as well as a second, thicker stem made of wire and several strands of white thread wrapped in green paper, are held together with wire and are wrapped in silver foil. The green stem is bare, suggesting that something else was once attached to it (perhaps a blossom?), but this has now become lost. The wires, like the ribbons, are attached to the card with metal staples. In total, there are ten staples, applied to both the front and back of the horse shoe.