24 Vintage Cufflinks and Tie Bars Found in Drawers That Buyers Pay Well For

There’s a specific kind of drawer in almost every house — the one with loose change, an old watch that stopped years ago, maybe a pocketknife nobody remembers buying. Tucked into that same drawer, more often than people expect, sits a small velvet box or a tangle of metal that once meant something. 

Cufflinks and tie bars don’t get much attention anymore, which is exactly why so many valuable ones are sitting untouched in nightstands and closets across the country. Some of them are worth a few dollars. 

Others are worth considerably more than anyone in the house would guess.

Swank Cufflinks

Swank made cufflinks by the millions, so most of them aren’t worth much. But certain lines — the enamel-and-gold sets from the 1950s, the ones with actual design behind them — hold real value with collectors. 

Look for the Swank name stamped on the back, not just a generic maker’s mark. Condition matters more than people think; a scratched-up pair from a bargain bin is not the same as one that’s been sitting untouched since 1958.

Hickok Tie Bars

Hickok built its name on precision, and it shows — the tie bars from the 1940s through 1960s have a weight and finish that cheaper brands never matched, which is exactly why they’ve held their value while so many competitors faded into landfill. There’s something almost architectural about the good ones, the way the metal catches light at an angle and holds it, like a tiny bridge cable stretched across a necktie. 

A Hickok bar with its original box, and the paper insert still intact, can turn a five-dollar flea market find into something closer to fifty. And that gap — between what people expect and what they get — is the whole reason this hobby has staying power.

Krementz Sets

Krementz built a reputation on gold overlay that actually lasted, unlike the flaking imitation gold from lesser makers. Their cufflink-and-tie-bar sets from the mid-20th century still show up in near-mint condition because the plating process was genuinely superior. 

Collectors pay a premium for matched sets in original packaging, especially the ones with the small Krementz oval mark on the back. To be fair, most people throwing these in a donation pile have no idea what they’re giving away.

Anson Cufflinks

Anson cufflinks sit at an odd intersection: mass-produced enough to be common, well-made enough to be collectible. The company’s mid-century designs — geometric, restrained, occasionally with a subtle stone insert — appeal to buyers who want vintage style without paying Tiffany prices. 

What tips value in either direction is completeness: a full boxed set with tie bar included sells for far more than loose pieces scattered across a drawer. There’s a quiet dignity to these that a lot of newer costume jewelry simply lacks.

Tiffany & Co. Sterling

Anything stamped Tiffany carries weight, and cufflinks are no exception. Sterling silver sets from the mid-20th century, especially the simpler knot or bar designs, regularly sell for hundreds at auction. 

The hallmark is everything here — a genuine Tiffany stamp on the post separates a modest curiosity from a serious find. Buyers scrutinize these closely, so authenticity checks matter more than sentiment.

Foster & Bailey

Foster & Bailey doesn’t carry the same name recognition as Tiffany, and that’s precisely the opportunity — the craftsmanship rivals bigger names, but the prices haven’t caught up yet, which means a sharp-eyed buyer can still find real value at estate sales before everyone else catches on. The company specialized in intricate metalwork, sometimes with tiny engraved monograms or floral detailing that looks almost engraved by hand under a loupe. 

So when a set turns up with the Foster & Bailey mark still legible, it’s worth more attention than the price tag suggests. Most sellers don’t know the name, and that gap is where the deals live.

Art Deco Enamel Sets

Art Deco cufflinks don’t whisper, they announce themselves — black enamel against polished gold, geometric lines cut sharp enough to look almost architectural, a confidence that nothing made after 1940 quite replicated. The design language of that era treated jewelry like small buildings, all angles and symmetry, and cufflinks were no exception. 

Original enamel work, unchipped and vivid, commands serious money because so few pieces survived a century without damage. Anyone who finds a genuine Deco set intact is holding something rarer than they probably realize.

Mother-of-Pearl Cufflinks

Mother-of-pearl cufflinks have a strange kind of stubbornness to them — decades in a drawer, and the shell still catches light like it just came out of water. There’s something almost tidal about the way the color shifts from white to faint blue to a ghost of pink depending on the angle, a small performance most people never bother to watch. 

Collectors gravitate toward sets with minimal yellowing and no cracking along the shell’s natural grain. The value isn’t loud, but it’s consistent, the way certain quiet things in a house turn out to matter more than the flashy ones.

Georg Jensen Modernist

Georg Jensen cufflinks are not subtle about their worth, and buyers know it immediately. The Danish silver house built a reputation on clean modernist lines, and its cufflinks from the 1940s through 1960s are genuinely museum-adjacent in design quality. 

A verified Jensen mark on a pair can push value into the hundreds without much debate. This is one case where the name alone does most of the talking, no persuasion required.

Larter & Sons

Larter & Sons occupies a strange middle ground in the collecting world — respected enough to matter, obscure enough that most sellers underprice it without realizing what they’re holding. The company produced fraternal and military cufflinks with genuine detail work, small emblems raised just enough to catch a fingernail. 

And what makes this one interesting is the crossover appeal: collectors who care nothing about jewelry still want these for the fraternal history attached. So a piece that looks like costume jewelry to one person looks like a small find to another.

Military Insignia Cufflinks

Military cufflinks carry history the way a uniform does — the insignia isn’t decoration, it’s identity. Sets bearing Army, Navy, or Air Force emblems from World War II and Korea attract collectors who want tangible connection to that period, not just aesthetic appeal. Condition takes a back seat here to authenticity; a slightly worn pair with verified service history outsells a pristine reproduction every time. 

The story attached to the object often matters more than the object itself.

Masonic Cufflinks

Masonic cufflinks are everywhere, and yet the good ones are surprisingly hard to find. Most were mass-produced with cheap plating, but the older sterling or gold-filled versions with detailed compass-and-square emblems draw serious collector interest. 

To be fair, plenty of sellers assume all Masonic jewelry is worthless because so much of it is common — which is exactly the assumption that lets sharp buyers pick up the real ones cheaply. It’s a niche market, but a loyal one.

Sterling Silver Cufflinks

Sterling silver cufflinks hold value for a simple reason: the material itself is worth something, regardless of design. Unmarked or poorly marked pairs still fetch decent prices based on weight and purity alone. 

Genuine sterling from known makers multiplies that baseline value considerably. This is the rare category where even a mediocre design doesn’t tank the resale price.

Gold-Filled Sets

Gold-filled cufflinks get dismissed constantly, mistaken for solid gold or written off as worthless costume pieces, when the truth sits somewhere quieter in between. The layering process used decades ago was thick enough that many pieces have survived seventy or eighty years without flaking, unlike modern gold plating that wears through in a season. 

So a gold-filled set from the 1940s can look almost indistinguishable from solid gold to an untrained eye, and buyers who know the difference still pay well for genuine vintage construction. It’s not about pretending it’s something it isn’t — it’s about respecting what it actually is.

Watch Cufflinks

Watch cufflinks are one of those ideas that sound gimmicky until you actually see one working. A tiny functional timepiece embedded into a cufflink face, the kind of novelty that only makes sense in an era before wristwatches were assumed. Working examples from the mid-20th century are rare enough that mechanical condition matters as much as appearance. 

Nonfunctioning ones still sell, but a ticking cufflink is a different kind of conversation piece entirely.

Art Nouveau Cufflinks

Art Nouveau cufflinks move like something alive — vines curling into initials, flowers pressed into gold like they were caught mid-bloom rather than manufactured. The style predates Deco by decades, and genuine pieces are correspondingly rarer, which pushes prices upward fast for anyone who can verify the period. 

There’s a softness to the linework that later styles abandoned entirely, almost as if jewelry design got more nervous as the century went on. Finding one intact feels less like a purchase and more like an inheritance from a stranger.

Tiger’s Eye Stone Cufflinks

Tiger’s eye cufflinks aren’t rare, and nobody should pretend otherwise. What separates a decent one from a valuable one is the setting — sterling or gold surrounding the stone, not cheap alloy that’s already gone dull. 

The stone itself holds up fine over decades; it’s the metal around it that usually gives away age and quality. A well-set pair from a known maker beats a flashy stone in cheap metal every single time.

Abalone Shell Cufflinks

Abalone cufflinks carry the ocean in a way that’s almost unsettling in a drawer full of dry metal — the shell shifts color under light like it’s still remembering water, greens sliding into blues into something closer to oil on pavement. Mid-century designers loved the material for exactly this reason, using thin polished slices set into simple frames that let the shell do all the work. 

The best examples show minimal fading, with color that still moves rather than sitting flat. It’s a small, strange kind of beauty to find sitting quietly next to a stack of old receipts.

Cloisonné Enamel Cufflinks

Cloisonné cufflinks are underrated, full stop. The technique — thin metal wires forming compartments filled with colored enamel — takes real skill, and the results have a depth that printed or painted designs can’t fake. Genuine cloisonné from established makers holds value well because the process itself is labor-intensive and increasingly rare. 

Anyone who dismisses these as “just colorful cufflinks” hasn’t looked closely enough.

Political Commemorative Cufflinks

Political cufflinks tell you exactly when they were made, and that specificity is the entire draw. Campaign-themed sets from presidential races decades past attract collectors who care as much about political history as jewelry. A candidate’s name, a campaign year, an emblem from a race most people have forgotten — all of it adds narrow but genuine collector demand. 

These aren’t for everyone, but for the right buyer, they’re worth real money.

Figural Novelty Cufflinks

Novelty cufflinks shaped like tiny objects — dice, golf clubs, cars, anchors — split collectors right down the middle. Some dismiss them as gimmicky filler from department store counters, and honestly, a lot of them are. 

But the well-made examples, cast with actual detail instead of stamped flat, hold surprising value with themed collectors who want a specific hobby or profession represented. It’s a category where charm occasionally outpays craftsmanship, which is saying something in this hobby.

Aviation Wing Tie Bars

Aviation-themed tie bars capture a moment when flying still felt like an event worth commemorating on your clothing. Pilot wing emblems, propeller shapes, small airline logos — these show up more often than expected in estate sale boxes, usually undervalued by sellers who don’t recognize the airline mark. 

The detail on genuine airline-issued pieces tends to be sharper than generic aviation novelty items, a distinction that matters enormously to collectors. Someone who worked for a specific airline decades ago left behind more history in that little drawer than they ever realized.

Chain-Link Convertible Cufflinks

Chain-link cufflinks, the kind that swing on a small connector rather than sitting rigid, get overlooked constantly because they look mechanically simple. And yet the mechanism itself is often the tell for age and quality — older, well-made links move smoothly and sit flush, while cheaper reproductions rattle or hang crooked. 

So a buyer who actually tests the movement, rather than just glancing at the design, finds value the casual seller missed entirely. It’s a small detail, but small details are where this whole hobby lives.

Monogram Engraved Sets

Monogrammed cufflinks are a strange category — personal enough that most people assume they’re worthless to anyone outside the family, valuable enough that specialized collectors actively seek them out anyway. Initials don’t hurt resale the way people assume; in fact, certain collectors specifically want engraved vintage sets for their historical authenticity. A monogram proves the piece was actually worn, actually owned, not sitting in a display case its whole life. 

That’s not a downside. That’s provenance.

Small Things That Outlast Their Owners

There’s something quietly moving about an object built to be worn every day for decades outliving the person who wore it, sitting in a drawer long after the shirts it matched have gone to donation piles. Cufflinks and tie bars were never meant to be permanent — they were meant to hold a sleeve together for one more meeting, one more wedding, one more ordinary Tuesday. 

And yet here they are, decades later, still catching light, still worth something to somebody. Before clearing out that drawer for good, it might be worth a second look at what’s actually sitting inside it.

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