Georg Jensen "Blossom" Silver Flatware, ca. 1925
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GUEST:
I found them buried in a drawer at my mother's house, and I told her how beautiful they were, and they didn't need to be in a drawer, so she gave them to me.
APPRAISER:
Do you know where she got them?
GUEST:
Her mother got them in the early '50s at an estate sale.
APPRAISER:
And do you know what your grandmother might have paid at that estate sale?
GUEST:
No clue.
APPRAISER:
Well, most silver spoons, and flatware in general, are worth little more than, if even as much as, the silver content, which for most spoons is less than $40 or $50-- even for big ones. Now, what you have here is something of great design, and it's really the exception to that rule. You have some silver spoons, a pair of servers, a larger server spoon, and a smaller spoon, all made by the same company. This is the company of Georg Jensen, or "Yorg Yensen," if you want to say it in the Danish. He was a Danish silversmith and jeweler, active in Copenhagen, and these were actually designed by him, as well as made by him. It's a famous Jensen pattern called the blossom pattern. This was designed in 1919.
GUEST:
Oh.
APPRAISER:
So it's not a modern thing, and yet there's a real modernism to it. People like Jensen today as much as they've ever done. And, in fact, Jensen is still a thriving company, and they still make this pattern.
GUEST:
Oh.
APPRAISER:
I looked at the marks on all of these pieces, and they all date to first half of the 1920s. Which helps. If they were modern blossom pattern, they would be worth a bit less than they are being early examples. I think if it came to auction today, I think you're going to find that the estimates would be at least $800 and maybe as much as $1,200 for the four pieces. Really nice.
GUEST:
Thank you.
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