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RR 2000/428 Tiffany Silver Flatware, 1845-1905 William P. Wood Jr, Roslyn Berlin and Edward Wawrynek Antique Collectors' Club Woodbridge, Suffolk 1999 350 pp. ISBN 1 85149 325 5 L45.00
Keywords Consumer goods, Metals, Product innovation, Catering industry
This splendid book is sub-titled "when dining was an art", and the reader has only to open it at random to appreciate the truth of that statement. Tiffany's store in New York City began selling silver flatware for the dining table in the 1840s and continued developing their collections until well into the twentieth century. Although this type of product has been studied by antique collectors for many years, there has been a notable lack of assembled information about it. The introduction to this elegant and sumptuously illustrated volume tells us that, despite the fact that silverware of the Victorian era has been out of favour, "receiving a set of Tiffany flatware - new...