Nice find

PHOTOS REQUIRED - marks + item
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Zolotnik
Posts: 1024
Joined: Wed Mar 02, 2011 10:35 am
Location: Germany

Nice find

Post by Zolotnik »

Hi all -
found a nice sugartongs from Gratschew Brothers with French importmark (bought it in Paris from an old man...). Interesting griffin pattern, favoured at that time.

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Regards
Zolotnik
dognose
Site Admin
Posts: 59003
Joined: Thu Dec 29, 2005 12:53 pm
Location: England

Re: Nice find

Post by dognose »

Hi Zolotnik,

Thanks for sharing this with us.

Thinking about the design some more, surely this is not a Griffin, but a Sphinx, a image so often seen on items in the French Empire design period. So I was wondering, is it likely perhaps that such piece was always intended for export to France, rather than for sale to the home Russian market?

Trev.
Zolotnik
Posts: 1024
Joined: Wed Mar 02, 2011 10:35 am
Location: Germany

Re: Nice find

Post by Zolotnik »

Hi Trev -

Thanks for correcting me - I always confuse Griffin with Sphynx....Sorry for that!
In my experience all the countries in Europe copied each other in the different styles en vogue at that certain time. There exist "English"- "Baltic" - and "French"- style sugartongs in Russia though the Russians had a very distinctive own design - but for the many Europeans in Russia (mainly in St. Petersburg and Moscow) they made the more wanted "like home" sugartongs. After the world exhibition in Chicago many American and continental firms ordered merchandise from Russia (mostly enamel made by famous artists like Klingert, Sazikov etc.). If Russia exported sugar tongs, among other things, to France - why not? I have many different (cigarette cases, matchbox covers, napkin rings, spoons etc.) objects with the French importmark (swan) in my collection which corroborate that idea.

Sphynx

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Griffin (shield missing - made by Fabergé))

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Regards
Zolotnik
dognose
Site Admin
Posts: 59003
Joined: Thu Dec 29, 2005 12:53 pm
Location: England

Re: Nice find

Post by dognose »

Hi Zolotnik,

Thanks again, that makes perfect sense.

Trev.
Zolotnik
Posts: 1024
Joined: Wed Mar 02, 2011 10:35 am
Location: Germany

Re: Nice find

Post by Zolotnik »

Hi all -
an other object with the much loved spynx motif by the Moscow smith A. Below:

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Regards
Zolotnik
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