Jensen USA Sugar Bowl

[neurorocker]

I am hoping for any information about the Jensen USA story. Anyone have a good online source? With this simple sugar bowl, can anyone tell me more about the BH stamp?

[AGHEAD]

Well there is zero comparison between GJ Denmark and GJ USA, the USA stuff is mostly borderline garbage in terms of value and respectability.

[Traintime]

Bing! You have received on violation from the content police for discussing value of an item. Please refer to your site regulations manual for an explanation. Ha, ha!

[neurorocker]

Do others agree that Jensen USA is borderline garbage? They were only manufacturing here a short time and I very rarely encounter it.

[JayT]

No, absolutely not garbage, borderline or otherwise. That was an unnecessarily harsh comment in my opinion. Two well-respected designer/silversmiths who were commissioned to create pieces for Jensen USA were Alphonse LaPaglia and William G. DeMatteo. There were others, but I don't know enough about the company to tell you more. I don't know who BH was.

Phyllis Drucker, the well-respected expert on Georg Jensen, has written a book about the US company. As for online resources, JCK Online has an article detailing the founding of the firm and its association with LaPaglia.

Well worth investigating more in depth.

[silverly]

At least for my own taste, I think it could be a much better looking sugar bowl if it were polished. Sorry, but as of yet, I have found nothing about the BH stamp.

[Traintime]

Made of a good substance. Does not leak. Serves it's purpose. I could not make it ( though I faintly recall making a tin sugar scoop in junior high metals shop--remember that anyone?). Finally, it has a textured surface on handles so it won't slip out of your hands like all this high tech junk such as cellphones--come on guys, can't you mold a non-slip design? So no complaints from this quarter about the sugar bowl.

[dragonflywink]

After the German invasion of Denmark in 1940, which essentially cut off Frederick Lunning's supply of Jensen silver and Royal Copenhagen porcelain, he operated the 'Georg Jensen, Inc., USA' shop as a sort of upscale department store for several years, carrying a wide variety of jewelry and decorative items, most of American manufacture. Though most Jensen collectors denigrate the Jensen USA pieces, they did carry some very nice 'Jensenesque' pieces by silversmiths like Alphonse La Paglia, William G. deMatteo, Walter Meyer and Joan Polsdorfer, but some stock was more pedestrian, your set, which to my eye shows little Scandinavian influence, pretty basic with die-rolled band handles, was made by Newark, NJ manufacturer Becht & Hartl (c. 1935-50).

The Druckers addressed the Jensen, USA production in their 'Georg Jensen, 20th Century Designs' (2002), and Janet Drucker later co-authored with Nancy Schiffer, 'Jensen Silver: The American Designs (2008) - both books are readily available, might try your local library, they can also be borrowed through inter-library loans...

~Cheryl

[dognose]

Link to part of a 1941 advertisement that reveals the supply of Georg Jensen silverware had dried up in the USA:

viewtopic.php?f=38&t=36151&p=113444&hilit=jensen#p113444

Trev.

[AGHEAD]

No matter what anyone might tell you....the USA Jensen products are NOT Jensen products, they are third tier American impostors at best. Value wise we are not supposed to discuss....but really it is like comparing a beautiful Tiffany piece from the 1870s to a Tiffany piece from Italy circa 1980....there is in no way any sort or realistic comparison.