Arthur Stone Arts & Crafts Sterling Silver Decorated Small Bowl, Gardner, MA, c. 1920

Beautifully proportioned, this bowl is a wonderful example of hand-raised silver with stunning hand-chased decoration. It has a hand-drawn applied band around the outer rim, a complementary banded foot, and features the lovely soft hammered surface typical of Stone's shop. Examples of decorated sterling from the shop of Arthur Stone are quite scarce and always interesting. 

Precise chasing creates 5 stems rising from the base with dramatic representations of roses in bloom with branches and leaves. The imaginative design has the stem of the flower behind a double-line horizontal band while the leaf stems are on the front as if it was supporting the flower. Another double-line chased element is above the floral decorations. The chasing on this bowl is in remarkable condition - no details have been lost, you can still feel the crispness of the design.

Arthur Stone was the undisputed master silversmith of the Boston arts and crafts movement. His shop produced some of the finest silver ever made, and many of the journeymen who worked for him were masters in their own right. Unlike other shops, Stone allowed his journeymen to mark their work. In this case, the 'C' mark could be for David Carlson or Magnus Carlberg who would have raised the bowl to be decorated by Stone. A larger version of this bowl with the same decoration is in The Denver Art Museum and is pictured in Arthur J. Stone. (1)

This stunning arts & crafts bowl is marked underneath with Stone's shop mark used from 1910-37 along with 'STERLING/ C'. It measures 5.25 inches in diameter by 2.25 inches high, weighs 7.25 troy ounces and is in excellent antique condition.

Provenance:
ARK Antiques, 1995
Private Collection

Endnotes:

1. Elenita C. Chickering, Arthur J. Stone 1847-1938: Designer and Silversmith, (Boston: the Boston Athenaeum, 1994), p. 166