This little tag came in among a lot of silverplate — tarnished black, easy to walk past, with what looked like a fancy letter on the front. A proper look under the loupe, and a little light polishing, told a very different story.
It’s a sterling silver wine label — the kind that once hung by a fine chain around the neck of a decanter, so a host could tell the Claret from the Port without pulling every stopper. This one is the letter “C,” for Claret — but in black-letter, the old Gothic script, which is why it looks so unlike the plain C we write today. The hallmarks date it to the year: London, 1848 — early Victorian, Queen Victoria on the throne eleven years — made by Charles Rawlings & William Summers, a London firm known for exactly this kind of small, fine silver.
Now, the colour — because this is the part worth slowing down for.
It isn’t paint, and it isn’t a coloured stone. It’s enamel, which is powdered glass fused to metal in a kiln. But it’s a particular, harder kind called basse-taille (French for “low-cut”), and here’s the trick of it: before any glass goes on, the silversmith hand-engraves the silver underneath in a fine, wave-like pattern. Then translucent red and blue enamel is laid over that engraving and fired. Because the glass is see-through, light passes down through the colour, catches the engraved silver beneath, and bounces back up — so the piece doesn’t just sit there flat, it glows and shifts as it moves. Every wave you can see under the red is a cut made by hand, one at a time, on a piece less than half the size of a business card.
It’s slow, exacting work with no margin for a slip — the enamel either comes out of the kiln clean or it cracks and you start over. Which makes the condition of this one quietly remarkable: 178 years, and not a single chip.
A small thing, a lovely thing — and older than the province it now sits in. (British Columbia joined Confederation in 1871. This label already had a 23-year head start.)
And that’s rather the point. This nearly went out with the plate. So before the next houseful of “old junk” heads for the curb — before you hand the boxes to the fellow with the truck — give the small, dark, unglamorous things a slow look. The tag nobody can read. The dented little spoon. The thing that “can’t be worth anything.” That’s exactly where the good stuff hides, and once it’s gone in a bulk lot, it’s gone for good. If a piece has you puzzled, bring it in and we’ll look at it together. No charge to wonder.
Leslie
778-708-0454
The Pound & the Provenance
7791 Steveston Highway
(northwest corner of No. 3 Road and Steveston Highway)
Richmond, BC, Canada
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Please Note: I am not an appraiser, a seamstress, a silversmith, or a gemologist. I am an antiques dealer. A generalist with a love for things with a bit of age. I had a stroke, four years ago, and AI is helping me to do better than I would have. Nothing here is false, everything here is true. I hope you enjoy it and please leave a message.
Ref. no. 1075
As I get going on this little project, I will add excerpts and links below. Please feel free to comment, add and send links – the more information and the easier it becomes to find it, the better for everyone!
