Featured R&B mark - Reed & Barton?

I have a spoon ring that appears to be in the Reed & Barton Wild Rose I pattern. It is marked R&B Sterling. I wonder about the mark as I have not been able to find another Reed & Barton mark that is a simple R&B. I've looked in the Kovel's marks book and at the 925 - 1000.com site.

Any thoughts about this mark?

Thanks!

 

It sure does look like the Wild Rose I variant of the Harlequin pattern (1958-1976 or so.) Given the very small space available for the marks, I can imagine that they abbreviated to R&B for this kind of thing.

 

Thanks Bakers. I guess I thought that the ring was made from a regular piece of flatware that would have been normally marked.

 

But "spoon rings" were originally made by the company, not by someone who bought up random spoons and reworked them into jewelry. At least that's my recollection.

 

Good to know, I did not realize that companies made spoon rings - I thought they were all reworked from regular flatware.

 

Well, like I said - my recollection - but that not be correct, of course. There were also tiny "lapel pins" in various patterns too.

The best way to check is to see whether you can find an unaltered piece of the Harlequin pattern that shows how it is marked.

 

I thought flatware rings were a product of street artists/craft shows. Way back in the '70s, where someone thought up the idea and then it spread.

I didn't realize the silver companies also produced and marketed the rings. Bakers, do you know when they started doing that?

 

I don't, cluttered. And as I said above that "information" may just be a figment of what is now a very old "memory."

 

I think the started out as street vendor/craft fair items, and the manufacturers eventually decided to cash in themselves.

 

I don't know about the rings, but in 1970, I bought a factory-direct Lunt spoon bracelet at a jewelry store in the town where Lunt silver was still being made.

 

Depending on which internet site you would believe....spoon rings have been on and off since the 1600's.

 

Well, it appears that Lunt DID make its own spoon rings, too:


As for R&B, I don't know.