Scans of 1912 wallpaper samples from a sample catalogue put out by Franz Schlote Dresden. Collections of SLUB Dresden, The Saxon State and University Library Dresden.
Category: British
Time to fix up the living room before your future mother in law stops by for a drink. A few little somethings found in a 1920s trade catalogue titled “East Meets West” Luxury Lampshades and Pillows” published by the luxury department store Harvey Nichols & Company Ltd, London.
Harvey Nichols and Company Ltd. still has a store in Knightsbridge. They also have stores in Edinburgh, Birmingham, Leeds and Manchester, Bristol and Dublin. or shop online harveynichols.com.
Silver salts in fun designs from Hunt & Roskell, a British jewelry and silversmithing firm that operated from 1843 to 1897. Queen Victoria shopped there a lot.
South African flower pictures. From 1848 but they probably still look like the same. Taken from Arabella Roupell’s “Specimens of the Flora of South Africa by a Lady.” The first edition and published by the Shakespeare Press.
Arabella Roupell travelled in Cape Colony between 1843 and 1845. There she met the botanist Nathaniel Wallich, who encouraged her to publish her drawings, as did Sir William Hooker, director of Kew Gardens, who made the selection of images to be included in Specimens. The text was supplied by the Irish botanist William Henry Harvey. This captioning is from a listing on a current Bonhams catalogue here https://www.bonhams.com/auction/29883/lot/20/roupell-arabella-e-specimens-of-the-flora-of-south-africa-by-a-lady-first-edition-w-nichol-shakespeare-press-1849/ . They are auctioning one of the lithographs that I didn’t pick up for this post but you can see it at the link. I found a scan of the book it was taken from over on the Biodiversity Heritage Library which is connected with the Smithsonian.
Imagery from “Illuminated ornaments : selected from manuscripts and early printed books, from the sixth to the seventeenth centuries.” Mostly medieval, all lovely and in wonderful colors. Published in 1833 so very early. Drawn and engraved by Henry Shaw with descriptions by Sir Frederick Madden who was Assistant Keeper of manuscripts at the British Museum.
Learning to draw and write the pretty way. Imagery from the 1750 alphabet book “Writing and drawing made easy, amusing and instructive : containing the whole alphabet in all the characters now us’d . . .” Printed for and sold by T. Bellamy bookseller at Kingston upon Thames.
Will be back to pick up more of the letters later.
Silver locomotives. A new centerpiece or to dress up the mantlepiece. Also a presentation railroad carriage in sterling silver running on its own track made in 1860 that I just found over on 1st Dibs.
Parcel-gilt silver filigree locomotive form spice box with rose-gilt caps, the front with later Hebrew inscription with a dedication to a synagogue, presumably the one it was given to in Bucharest. 1850-1900. Not sure where it was made but it was given to a synagogue in Bucharest, Romania. From the style and ornamentation it looks like it was made in Eastern Europe, not Britain. Judaica. Image @ 2024 Sothebys. Fair use license. via https://www.sothebys.com/en/buy/auction/2022/the-halpern-judaica-collection-tradition-and-treasure-part-i/a-parcel-gilt-silver-filigree-locomotive-form
Sterling silver locomotive Christmas tree ornament. ca. 1970s. American. Gorham, maker. © 1stDibs.com, Inc. 2024
Fair use license. https://www.1stdibs.com/furniture/dining-entertaining/sterling-silver/sterling-silver-christmas-tree-locomotive-ornament-gorham/id-f_820765/?crlt.pid=camp.uMYGBFXO5fHb&epik=dj0yJnU9Nks0aVlHVy02T0xjQXFYcEpmTUwyWV9Hb1FNX2hiTEsmcD0wJm49Y0lhZG1ISGY3UWgzSkI1SWxHanFEZyZ0PUFBQUFBR1hvOWZ3
Watercolors of fashionable interiors in houses and hotels that look to be from the 1840s. From an album probably kept by a female member of the Coote family whose family seat was at Ballyfin, Leinster, Ireland. The album being up for sale on the website of rare book dealer Justin Croft.
Live in the 18th century at least until you turn the television on. Plates of ornamental designs from 1728 taken from James Gibbs’ work “A book of architecture: containing designs of buildings and ornaments.”
New South Wales, Australia just a little while ago. Plates from the second edition of David Collins’s “An account of the English Colony in New South Wales, from its first settlement in January 1788 to August, 1801. Published in London in 1804.
