Silver Spoon Antiques

The Society of Arts and Crafts of NSW was a guild of artists in New South Wales, Australia established in 1906 by 6 craftspeople. The Society held its first exhibition in 1907 and continued to hold annual exhibitions into the 1930s, with works of metalwork, jewellery, pottery, china painting, weaving, embroidery and pokerwork displayed and sold. Henry Farmer was a former mayor of Manly and with his wife Rachel had two daughters, Helen and Marjorie. The two Farmer sisters were involved in the Society in the late 1920s-early 1930s. Helen already had a reputation as an artist, being well known for her etchings. Her younger sister Marjorie was more of a jack of all trades and is recorded as creating a number of different pieces in different mediums. She also served on the executive in 1928. After the death of their parents, both sisters moved out to Bathurst in 1936 and lived there for the rest of their lives. A description of some of the work noted by Miss Farmer and other members....

Joseph Hendry Grice, Brisbane  (working from c.1900 to c.1920) Joseph Hendry Grice was born in Brisbane in 1877 and opened his own store in Queen Street on Aug 5th 1907. He had previously been in a partnership Swift & Grice and had a store in the Valley (from around 1902). He was active in the Brisbane Municipal Band. He cleared most of his stock in 1917 to move to smaller premises in the basement of the same address. By 1920 the business was still trading under his name in Adelaide Street, but was now owned by Mr Bishop when a large amount of jewellery (1000 pounds worth!) was stolen in a robbery. The name appears to have been changed to the well known Wallace Bishop by 1922. In the 1920s Grice was the mayor of Southport. Opening advertisement 1907 In both the partnership Swift & Grice and as a sole trader, Grice donated a number of trophies and gold medals for various sporting events including swimming, skating and cricket. Show below is a gold fob with t...

From L to R - Coffee Spoons, Teaspoons, Dessert Spoons, Table Spoons (with a Basting Spoon above) Apparently this is a very popular question on google! Now most people are probably looking for a cooking measurement (its volume in cooking is 4.93ml btw), but it is also a question that is often raised in describing a spoon...what is a teaspoon? A dessert spoon? A coffee spoon? A table spoon? The answer to this is often different at different points of history, but below is a rough guide for the Georgian and Victorian periods. Coffee Spoon These are a more modern spoon, mainly dating from 1890 onwards. They are smaller than teaspoons, usually between 9cm (3.5in) and 11cm (4.3in). Teaspoon  These come in a range of sizes...the smallest around 12cm (4.7in) long and the longest approximately 14cm (5.5in). Dessert Spoon Our modern day Tablespoons are really more traditional dessert spoon size. They range in size from around 17cm (6.7in) to 18...

A 1676 map of the Somers Isles (Bermuda) by John Speed, based on the map of surveyor Richard Norwood Bermuda is a fairly isolated set of islands in the Atlantic Ocean around 650 miles east of the coast of North Carolina. There are seven main islands and several more smaller islands. The main islands are all close enough to be connected by bridges and are usually referred to together as the Island of Bermuda. The islands were first discovered by Jaun de Bermudez in 1503. Juan was a Spanish explorer and, although the island is named after him he didn't attempt to land on the islands because of the dangerous reef. Over 100 years later in 1609, George Somers was leading a group of colonists from England when they were shipwrecked on Bermuda. They found the island to be uninhabited. They were stranded there for 10 months. When they returned and told stories of the beautiful island, King James decided to extend the Charter of the Virginia Company to include it in 1612. That sam...