News from the Time Was Antiques. We have been in business since 1988 first with an antiques bricks-and-mortar and online since 2001 and exclusively online since 2003. Cheers!
For you fans of Downton Abbey who like a more documentary, scholarly approach to what living in an English Edwardian stately home was like, PBS airs Secrets Of The Manor House tonight on PBS. On our PBS it is at 7pm just prior to last week's episode which is aired just before tonight's episode. It looks very interesting.
The Edwardian era, named for the time Edward VII was king after the death of Queen Victoria in 1901 and stretching to the crowning of George V in 1910 is an era that is fascinating for it being so transitional on so many levels in English society, affecting the home, economy, government and individual right. I love the insights. Here is a preview video from the PBS site:
I am joining the Pink Saturday blog party hosted by Beverly of How sweet the Sound. I have a pink rose patter, ceramic center English horse brass to share.
I thought I would share this, because it's something we sell a lot of, but not many people know what they are. Horse brasses are brass ornaments that were...and still are...used to decorate the harnesses of draft horses as well as identify the owner. Horse brasses were developed sometime in the 15th century as good luck charms or amulets of protection and developed over the years into decorative items for harnessing. They were made for all manner of occasions from royalty to clubs, organizations, guilds or trade unions, travel souvenirs and you name it!
They were morphrd into decorative items in the early part of the 20th century and became popular to hang in pubs and in homes around the fireplace as a look back to the Victorian era when they were wildly popular as there were so many horses in harness. They were reproduced in several areas of England until the 1970s and now you can find tourist brasses that are made in China. But they are easy to spot when you know what to look for.
This is a more traditional horse brass from 1898 commemorating the famous English jockey Fred Archer. Fred Archer was the greatest jockey of the 19th century by winning the Derby 5 times but killed himself in 1886 and became a bit of a legend.
The rose design ceramic center horse brass was made in the 1960s as a decorative item and is very pretty. I have actually seen some used on horses in the UK, but they are usually only hung on the wall.
A fun Englsh collectible. To see more horse brasses at Time Was Antiques, click on the photos.
This is so cool it's HOT...and hard not to get steamed up about it......Okay, I'm sorry, but I couldn't help it!
Kitchenalia or kitchen collectibles are so much fun. This is an English tin pudding mold (or if a Brit, a mould) for steaming puddings (or if you're a Yank, desserts) that I LOVE to find in England when I'm there shopping for treasures. This one has a central spire or chimney which was used to convect the heat up through the middle to make sure the pudding is cooked all the way through.
You can even see years of discoloration on the outside caused by the boiling water in the kettle as the pudding steams. These work well for any kind of pudding...as an example the famous Christmas Plum pudding. These pudding tins were popular all through the victorian era to the second world war and some are still passed down in families to be used for special desert occasions.
To see more photos and info about the pudding mold use this clickable link to the listing at Time Was Antiques.
One of the great things about collecting kitchenalia or kitchen items is their relative affordability still. It's a great form of recycling and frankly, most of the older items are far better made and will last longer than their contemporary counterparts.
Here is a link to a great English Kitchenalia blog I found recently: kitchenalia
So the next time you are looking for a cooking ir kitchen item...thing of your local antique shop, flea market or swap meet. Old is new with an economic purpose again!
We have had the most beautiful week here...if you have been watching the Olympics in Vancouver which is northeast of us here at the top of Washington state's Olympic Peninsula you've seen what it's like here, but rain is coming in tomorrow. Sigh...back to normal. But hope it's spring where you are!
I absolutely love this figural dolphin antique English ring holder. Ring holders have been in use since rings were around...800 years perhaps? And ring holders have ranged from the pure practical to an elegant statement of the prevailing tastes of the period. This great ring holder is fashioned after a renaissance or elizabethan dolphin...I've seen it's twin on an old map when the explorers expected to fall off the end of the flat world! The detail is really terrific and although made in England 1920-1930s, it remembers an earlier and more decorative period. Things were about to change even more with the advent of art deco and the modern taste when this poor dolphin design would definitely be OUT!
You can see more about the dolphin ring holder at Time Was Antiques.
We are still running our FRESH START free shipping on orders over $25.00 with the code listed on the website. We all need a little after-the-holidays boost, don't we?
Today is Epiphany or Twelfth Night, the night the e wisemen or magis reached the Christ child and is traditionally the end of the Christmas season. We have our outdoor Christmas lights on tonight for the last time...they're coming down tomorrow. Then everything will look bare and dull.
But then we get to look forward to Valentine's Day, presidential holidays and generally the hope of spring to come.
Have a great day tomorrow (while we are taking down the lights) and have a cuppa tea for me!
Time Was Antiquesjust added this great pair of British Royal memorabilia plaques or wall plates from our archives. The plaques or plates feature photos under glass of Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Philip in 1953 for the coronation. The thing that is cool about this (besides their being so young) is the punched chrome border with the cutouts being crowns. I am a sucker for unusual things like that. I think they are so cool!!! She was a lovely lady and he was quite handsome. Ah youth. Now in their 80s things have changed. Although the pair has been sold, I did find the Prince Philip one...
A fun link is the Royal Channel on youtube...who knew??? Its been going for a bout 2 years ago. I mentioned it in my newsletter about then anyway. Lots of fun info and videos. The Royal Channel
Weather this last few days is typically pacific northwest. Rain, then some rain & then a bit of rain. We in Sequim (called the Blue Hole from the view pilots got as they flew by) is better than most of the area. But we love it anyway.
Time Was Antiques will be adding lots of fun stuff as we go through the holidays and we are featuring a 15% or FREE shipping in the USA for orders over $50.00 through the end of November. You can check it out at Time Was Antiques.
Have a great weekend...lots of good seasonal cheer and Christmas arts & crafts shows to visit. Have fun!
I am always on the out look for new artists making a name for themselves. The sugar shaker or muffineer shown is by an English ceramics artist Lorna Bailey. Lorna has a style influenced by Clarice Cliff but has added a more modern twist to her work. She is at work now and is becoming quite collectible. I believe that will grow in the future. A name to remember & look out for while she is still affordable.
Gorgeous fall weather here in the pacific northwest. Wonderful days for walks looking at the turning leaves. Tomorrow we hope to do some garden clean up. I am replacing the wreath on the door with the one I made of autumn leaves. I am also beginning to brace for the upcoming holiday season and begin tomorrow to focus on the shop...adding items I am just unpacking from the last buying trip and deciding what items to put on sale. It will be a fun week!!
Purple rules!!! The royal color. I have just unpacked this brilliant purple cased glass napkin ring that has been cut to clear and it is fab! The napkin ring was found in England at the Portobello Road antique market. I LOVED the color! It was actually a sunny day so it fairly glowed. It made the trip home sfely as well.
Cased glass is made with 2 layers and then the outer colored layer is cut to reveal the inner clear layer. A neat process and very effective! I love colored glass and this is beautiful.
Weather here has been intermittant clear and clouds and the trees are beginning to turn color. Fall is indeed approaching. I'm okay with that. I'm planning to get our a fertilize the garden for next years blooms tomorrow, so hope it's mostly clear. Have a great day. Purple cased glass napkin ring at Time Was Antiques
And I don't mean does it grow on bread or mean your food has gone bad. Pudding molds or moulds have abeen a big deal for 200-300 years. And as every dessert lover knows, that's an important part of every meal.
Like the VERY old song "I say tomato, you say tomayto" the mold vs mould isn't a case of pronounciation but of spelling from origin. In the UK and countries with a British flavor it's mould, but in America it's mold.
Pudding molds have been made of several materials and collected widely since their real popularity in victorian times. Because of the victorian penchant to beautify everything within an inch of it's life, ornamentation was applied to the dining table and to how the food looked as well. A plain pudding (also a generic term for dessert in the UK) was a no-no on the victorian dining table so the pans desseerts were cooked in were fancied up so that a design was baked (or steamed) right in. There are figural designs, animals, vegetables and minerals, flowers, trees, castles & shields. This is a late victorian era stoneware mold or mould with a very popular and relatively simple design like bubbles or golf balls with paneled sides.
Molds or moulds are a wonderful collectible and make decorative groupings on shelves or counters. Cool.
To see the molds (or moulds) at Time Was Antiques, click this link: Time Was Antiques
