Antiques Board

I bought this today. And it's beeeyoooteeeful.




Operational lock & key


Upon first opening. Lid flips over to produce writing-surface (complete with original blotting-paper)


Original inkwell (very rare), and storage-compartment (needs a bit of repair)....

Sewing machines have always fascinated me. Probably because my grandmother was a dressmaker for 40 years.

Either way, I've always loved antique sewing machines. Their beauty and decorations, their functionality, and the fact that they were one of the marvels of 19th century design, styling and engineering.

I have two sewing machines. My grandmother's which I inherited when she died, and this one:



I bought this in 2012 and it took me two years to restore it. I had to find bobbins, attachments, the oil-can, the lid, the key, the second cover-plate, I had to clean it, oil it, scrub it over to remove 80 years of dust and grime. I had to fix the hand-crank and the bobbin-winder (it took three attempts but I finally got it working flawlessly!)....

I've shown these elsewhere, but I thought that I'd make a dedicated thread for them, as well.







The Historical Context

What you're looking at here are a pair of solid silver Peranakan nyonya dress belts.

Peranakan (also called "Straits Chinese") were the descendants of Chinese merchants who married the native peoples of the Malay Peninsula, between the 15th and 19th...

I had purchased an atomizer a few months ago and have been going slightly mad looking for an atomizer bulb to fit it. I was pretty much at my wits end trying to find one that would fit this Czech bottle.

I had posted for some help here and a few folks offered u ideas and took a look through their stashes to see if the could come up with anything.

Bercrystal found a couple of bulbs she thought might work and graciously offered them up to me. I received the bulbs yesterday and unfortunately they didnt fit, but I was not about to let that stop me. I had read online about swapping out the fitting on the bulb with one of the correct size. I had the original from my atomizer and figured I would at least take a look at it. Well, it was going to be too big to do the swap, so I was back to square one.

I work in a field where sometimes you need to make things work, so I can usually come up with a viable alternative.

I decided this morning to make an adapter that would screw into my...

Found by a metal detectorist in Scotland.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...artefacts-including-ancient-silver-cross.html

I think a teacup in solid silver is about as decadent as you can get.

Real folks use a thick china mug

La-di-da finger crooking people use cups without broken handles, with a few flowers, made when people used to like flowers.

Solid silver teacups is just drinking out of money. Silver teacup drinkers are simply taking a few minutes break from grinding the faces of the poor, and will get back to it refreshed.

However, my silver teacup collection (and they are very hard to find as poor-face-grinders never part with anything) reflect the national characters of the nations that made them.

British sterling. Modest, plain, restrained, possibly a bit embarassed




Austro Hungarian late 19th C. Elegant, fine restrained decoration, fin de siecle Vienna cafe, almost excusable.



French, same period, twice the size of the others and mad as a fish.




All top grade silver from the respective countries.

Another favorite of mine... Bohemian Kralik Art Glass Seashells. Another organic shape that comes in a variety of colour. A few of these shapes can be identified in the West Virginia Museum of American Glass, Monograph No. 59., Czech Glass Catalog featuring Kralik. You can purchase this catalog on eBay.

If you have any questions, about the decors or any of the vases, pleased to be of help. I will be posting more examples in this thread.

For my first posting, I thought it would be perfect to share what I love the most with collecting Bohemian art glass. Here is a few blooms from Kralik. These forms I refer to as floriforms and are from the Art Nouveau era. They have an beautiful organic shape and come in many various colours. I am new to the site and looking forward to meeting others of interest. I do research glass and hope I can be of help to others on this site. So bare with me as I get the hang of using this site. Hope you enjoy looking at a sample of my glass garden. Thanks! ~Leah

The most interesting aspect about collecting Victorian Art Glass shakers and condiment sets is that you can collect just about all types of Victorian Art Glass and display it in a small area.

These types of items include salt, pepper, sugar shakers as well as mustard jars, small cruet bottles, and toothpick holders. If you are lucky enough you may run across a silverplate holder of the period that will hold the pieces! The holders can be very ornate and really enhance the shakers in which they hold. As mentioned above, these items come in all sorts of art glass. This includes cased glass, decorated opalware as well as many other forms of enameled glass. Others include Amberina, Burmese, Peachblow, Findlay Onyx, Opalescent, Chocolate glass and so many others.
Some of the manufacturers that made these items are Mt Washington, New England Glass, Consolidated Glass, Hobbs Brockunier, Challinor Taylor, Northwood, and so many others of the period.

Some folks just didn't know how to have fun in the good ol' days...



...or DID they?



HEY HEY it's Friday NIGHT! Let's go watch folks lay in coffins!