Tiffany Studios

Arnold King

Sotheby’s New York, December 1, 1989, lot 342

Jay and Micki Doros, acquired from the above

Sotheby's New York, The Doros Collection: The Art Glass of Louis Comfort Tiffany, December 7, 2023, lot 435

Acquired from the above by the present owner

Alastair Duncan, Louis C. Tiffany: The Garden Museum Collection, Woodbridge, Suffolk, 2004, p. 366

Martin Eidelberg, Nina Gray and Margaret K. Hofer, A New Light on Tiffany: Clara Driscoll and the Tiffany Girls, exh. cat., New York Historical Society, New York, 2007, p. 83, fig. 50

Alastair Duncan, Tiffany Lamps and Metalware, Woodbridge, Suffolk, 2019, p. 474, no. 1912

The company’s use of the term “Fancy Goods” initially appears in their 1906 Price List. Objects that fall under that category, however, were first made almost a decade earlier. The Tiffany Glass and Decorating Company established a foundry, capable of producing bronze castings of a phenomenal quality, in the late 1890s and suitable metalware of all types were soon being manufactured. Desk accessories were extremely popular, and perhaps no single type of object best typifies the firm’s decorative imagination than their inkstands. The one offered here exemplifies the quality of the foundry’s castings as well as Driscoll’s designing talents.

The design was first created around 1899 and listed as an “inkstand in metal, wild carrot flower design” when it was included in Sigfried Bing’s exhibition of Tiffany’s work held that year at London’s Grafton Galleries.  It was described in the company’s 1906 price list as “855. INKSTAND, Metal, Wild Carrot, diameter 5½“….$12.00.” Also known as Queen Anne’s lace, which Tiffany thought of as a “charming weed,” it was a plant that appears in many of the company’s metalware, including candlesticks and lamp bases. The patinated inkstand has a circular base, cast with the plant’s roots in low relief, supporting an oval body with wild carrots in various heights of relief and with a scalloped top rim. A hinged cover, scalloped to fit the top rim, is finely cast with wild carrot flowers.

The inkstand, discontinued by 1913, beautifully demonstrates Tiffany Studios’ ability to transform a standard, prosaic desk accessory into something to be treasured by its owner. Louis Comfort Tiffany, through his thoughts and actions, imbued each item produced by his company with an artistry and sense of design rarely matched in American history.

– PAUL DOROS