|
|
|
| How to Post Photos |
REGISTER (click here)
|
|
|
|
| How to Post Photos |
REGISTER (click here)
|
|
 SMP Silver Salon Forums
 American Sterling Silver
 Dating by design?
|
 SSFFriend: Email This Page to Someone! |
next newest topic | next oldest topic |
| Author | Topic: Dating by design? |
|
vathek Posts: 966 |
posted 04-05-2008 01:00 PM
  
[01-2639] This is a nice older Webster sterling dish of good weight with what appears to me to be a somewhat commercial modern design from the late thirties or early forties. Would welcome opinions. IP: Logged |
|
argentum1 Posts: 602 |
posted 04-05-2008 09:06 PM
If there are marks please show them as they are a vital component when attempting identification. IP: Logged |
|
vathek Posts: 966 |
posted 04-07-2008 12:23 PM
here's the mark IP: Logged |
|
Paul Lemieux Posts: 1792 |
posted 04-10-2008 12:29 PM
Circa 1930s sounds like a reasonable guess to me. IP: Logged |
|
Dale Posts: 2132 |
posted 04-10-2008 11:57 PM
Late 20's would strike me as the earliest for this. The 30's or even immediate post war seems plausible. What size is it? IP: Logged |
|
vathek Posts: 966 |
posted 04-11-2008 01:33 PM
There are a pair which measure 6" across. I assume they are for bon bons or some such. I'm wondering if they are supposed to be puff balls. My interest in asking the question in the first place stems from items which reflect the period in which they were made. Georgian style sauce boats have been copied for years even until today but reflect a style popular in the mid 18th cent. I'm also curious about who may have designed them and did silver firms bring in well known outside designers like Donald Deskey to design items. In the case of these dishes I will probably never know. IP: Logged |
|
Dale Posts: 2132 |
posted 04-11-2008 04:17 PM
The problem we always face is that design gives us an idea of when an item was first made but does not tell us when it was discontinued. Old jewelers always told me that silver and china are subject to a 25 year cycle. People would buy a dish like this one when they married. And then as they approached their silver anniversary, they would buy more. And they would want more of what they already had. So, assume this was bought new in 1932. Which gives us 1957 as the outer date for sales. What complicates the situation is the way the jewelry trade actually operated. Old style jewelers were in an inventory game. Very few businesses operated this way, but the retail jeweler did. He would buy say 6 of the dishes. He would eventually sell 4 of them outright. The other 2 he would sit on for decades. When silver anniversaries came up, he could trot out the 2 and probably sell them. This is not a very modern way of doing business. Remember back then most people only had contact with their local jeweler. Who could maintain the illusion of availability even when the company was long gone. He simply pulled the dish from his backstock. I personally dealt with jewelers who were selling 1847 Rogers First Love pattern as new in the late 70's. When IS had discontinued it over 20 years previously. There was a lot of smoke and mirrors in the jewelry trade back then. Looking at the piece, I would say it started in the 30's and was probably available well into the early 70's. IP: Logged |
|
Richard Kurtzman Moderator Posts: 768 |
posted 04-11-2008 05:55 PM
vathek, At one time Webster did interesting designs - the late 1800's to very early 1900's. After about 1910 they became extremely run of the mill and from then on this almond dish was about as "exciting" as it got. (They also produced a 2 3/4" individual almond dish in this design.) A large amount of their items were made over and over in excess of fifty years and it's highly doubtful that they ever brought in anybody for anything. I think that a safe estimate for the time of manufacture is the 1940's. IP: Logged |
|
vathek Posts: 966 |
posted 04-12-2008 09:06 AM
Thanks for the pic Richard. I must now update my opinion by a decade and place these at ca. 1950. I seem to remember a post earlier about a Gorham item that looked like Narragansett but were instead a one off pattern for an almond set. Either almonds used to be quite popular or it was a generic name for a small all purpose dish. IP: Logged |
|
bascall Posts: 1629 |
posted 04-12-2008 10:14 AM
Richard, excellent information on Webster. Thank you! IP: Logged |
|
jersey Posts: 1203 |
posted 04-12-2008 04:49 PM
Such a lovely dish. At least you think they would have given it a name to go with the design within. That's my 2 cents worth. Great find Mr. Kurtzman! Jersey IP: Logged |
|
Dale Posts: 2132 |
posted 04-12-2008 05:19 PM
Naming of patterns and designs from lesser known manufacturers was frequently left up to the local retailer. The department store would pull together a room or table top and give it a theme name. There would be china, crystal, silver, linens and a dining room set all offered as one 'pattern'. These would vary city by city. I can see this being offered as a 'moderne' pattern as well as 'ranch' item. Really pushing it, would be 'oriental'. IP: Logged |
|
Richard Kurtzman Moderator Posts: 768 |
posted 05-08-2008 07:26 PM
vathek, I have made a mistake regarding the dating of your dish. I just found your piece in the 1938-1939 Webster Catalog and it is listed as a Bon Bon Dish. So your original dating was correct. My apologies for my error. IP: Logged |
|
vathek Posts: 966 |
posted 05-09-2008 09:53 AM
Thanks for the update Richard, my original instincts are vindicated. IP: Logged |
|
Kimo Posts: 1627 |
posted 05-12-2008 10:12 AM
While the design seems to date to the late 1930s, there is no way to be sure when your examples were made since it appears that they were being marketed in the 1940s and likely into the Reed and Barton era as well since the name and trademark was kept by R&B. IP: Logged |
|
Ulysses Dietz Moderator Posts: 1265 |
posted 05-23-2008 09:01 AM
Certain kinds of forms in "occasional" dishes appear repeatedly over time--shells, leaves, flowers...but there is a stylistic shift over time. The Webster dish here is distinctly of a style that, to me, could be either 30s or 40s in origin, but not (to my eye) earlier. There were earlier leaf-form bon-bons, but they would have had a distinctive sense of form and detail...the flattened stylization of this dish parallels textile, wallpaper and jewelry design in the late 1930s--which would have continued in the 1940s, before being revised again in the 50s. These dishes would have been just as at home in 1950s design, so there wouldn't have been need to change them...Van Day Truax began doing his own variation on such dishes in the 1960s for Tiffany & Co. IP: Logged |
All times are ET | next newest topic | next oldest topic |
  |
|
Ultimate Bulletin Board 5.46a
|
1. Public Silver Forums (open Free membership) - anyone with a valid e-mail address may register. Once you have received your Silver Salon Forum password, and then if you abide by the Silver Salon Forum Guidelines, you may start a thread or post a reply in the New Members' Forum. New Members who show a continued willingness to participate, to completely read and abide by the Guidelines will be allowed to post to the Member Public Forums. 2. Private Silver Salon Forums (invitational or $ donation membership) - The Private Silver Salon Forums require registration and special authorization to view, search, start a thread or to post a reply. Special authorization can be obtained in one of several ways: by Invitation; Annual $ Donation; or via Special Limited Membership. For more details click here (under development). 3. Administrative/Special Private Forums (special membership required) - These forums are reserved for special subjects or administrative discussion. These forums are not open to the public and require special authorization to view or post. |
|
copyright © 1993 - 2022
SM Publications
All Rights Reserved. Legal & Privacy Notices |
