J. Vieillard & Cie and A. de Caranza, Presentation Bowl, France, circa 1880

Beautiful oval-shaped bowl with flared edges, in engraved crystal with floral interlacing decoration. It is enclosed in an elegant openwork frame in chiseled and gilded bronze with e...

Important porcelain planter and decorative dish attributed to Samson & Cie. They are decorated with golden and red friezes of intertwined lotus, fruits and flower cups, fans and...

Important tray made in gilded bronze and “cloisonné” enamel attributed to Elkington and Willms. Ornamented with a centering polychrome enameled peacock plaque, made of very high standard quality, mounted on a gilt-bronze dish, decorated in relief with Japanese Nô theater masks. The great Birmingham firm of Elkingtons, was largely the creation of George Richards Elkington (1800-1865), who worked from 1824 in Birmingham as a manufacturer of silver-mounted scent bottles. By 1829 the business had expanded sufficiently for a branch to have been established in London. In the late 1830s the Elkingtons began making experiments to apply the principles of electro-metallurgy to gilding and plating with silver and in 1840 the patent was at last taken out. Elkingtons owed their rise to a position amongst the most important silversmiths of the country to their exploitation of this new process and the two of the most famous designers then employed, both of them French, Albert Wilms (1827-1899) and Morel-Ladeuil (1820-1888), who helped to make Elkingtons’ reputation with their elaborate exhibition pieces. Albert Willms was apprenticed as modeler and engraver to Klagman, Dieterle and Constant in Paris before working for Morel & Co. in London in 1848. On his return to Paris he was employed by the great Parisian silversmiths including Christofle and Froment-Meurice, for whom he designed pieces to be presented at the 1855 Universal Exhibition in Paris. It was during this period that he joined the firm of Elkington in London as head decorator. Elkington was soon to become one of the first to produce refined pieces in “champlevé” enamel in the Chinese and Japanese styles, which were presented with great success at the London Universal Exhibition in 1862 (see Masterpieces of Industrial Art & Sculpture at the International Exhibition 1862, J.B. Waring, London, 1863, III, pl. 211). Willms’ “champlevé” enamels could not be compared, however, with the delicate “cloisonné” enamels exhibited by Japan at the Universal Exhibition in Paris in 1867. This explains why Elkington adapted the ancient Japanese technique to produce pieces according to European taste and custom. Followings the 1867 Exhibition all the major European artists rivaled in ingenuity for the 1873 Universal Exhibition in Vienna. In London Albert Willms presented his luxurious vases and cups in “cloisonné” enamel for Elkington (see Illustrations of Art Manufacturers in the Precious Metals exhibited by Elkington & Co., Inventors, Patentees and Manufactures of electroplate, 1873), whilst in Paris, Ferdinand Thesmar (1843-1912) produced in the workshops of Ferdinand Barbedienne (1810-1892) a tray decorated with a golden pheasant in “cloisonné” enamel on copper...

Beautiful chiselled and gilded bronze centerpiece composed of a finely pierced bowl with an openwork rim of remarkable delicacy, decorated with scrolling foliage, arabesques, and int...

This is an antique decorative bowl. A Continental, ceramic serving dish, dating to the late Victorian period, circa 1900. Charmingly decorat...

19th century French faience charger or plate with Gien mark.

A magnificent ceramic plate measuring 47 cm in diameter and 10 cm in height, crafted in 19th-century Spain in the Nazari-Arabic style influenced by Al-Andalus culture. The piece show...

Delightful compote bowl made of slate and gilt bronze, having a beautiful Champlevé enamel design around the piece. Made in France, 19th Century (Barbedienne). Makers mark on the bas...