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Silver jubilee
Sterling flatware reflects taste at tables of distinction
By Betsy Lehndorff
Denver Rocky Mountain News Staff Writer
Sterling silver flatware is like jewelry for the senses.
Glimmering forks, knives and spoons, with their comfortable heft and soft patina, transform every bite into a gem, elevating an ordinary meal into a dining experience.
Colorado native Doug Kerbs uses a simple set of sterling silver every day, and not just because he is director of Tiffany's & Company in Cherry Creek.
He loves sterling and is buying the company's elaborate Olympian pattern, one piece at a time.
A five-piece place setting is $565. Each fork, knife and spoon is decorated with dozens of mythological figures molded into sterling scenes.
"The thing I enjoy is it's really such an elaborate and complex design," Kerbs says. "All surfaces have been taken into consideration — the Medusa head on the back of the spoon... It's truly a piece of art at all sides.
"Your flatware becomes a part of entertaining in the fact that you pick up a teaspoon and you can talk about the myth of Artemis and her nymphs."
Silver glossaryContinental Silver: Designs in sterling silver and silverplate best known for their decorative backs. Traditionally, these eating utensils have been larger than those made for American buyers. Dinner-Ssized: Utensils are about © of an inch longer than lunch-sized settings. Electroplating: A continuous electrical charge used to coat a worn utensil with silver (or any other metal.) Flatware: Knives, forks, spoons and serving pieces that are fairly flat. Three-piece place setting: usually contains a place fork, place knife and teaspoon, suitable for everyday use. Four-piece place setting: a three-piece setting plus a salad fork Five-piece place setting: for more formal occasions, it includes a soup spoon and can accommodate more courses. Six-piece place setting: includes a butter spreader Lunch-sized: smaller than dinner and continental sizes. A fork is about 71/2 inches, a knife 9 inches and a spoon 6 inches. Patina: A soft luster created by tiny scratches that come from frequent use. Silverplate: A base metal, usually nickel silver or brass, coated with a layer of pure silver by electroplating. Sterling Silver: A legal standard established in 14th century England that specified sterling silver is 925 parts pure silver and 75 parts metal, usually copper. Source: Reed & Barton
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"I just like the weight of it. With a lot of European patterns, the spoons were set face down, so the backs are ornamented."
The same is true of the forks.
"I'm a big believer that we don't do enough about special occasions," she says. "We get in such a hurry that we don't set a special table for someone's birthday or because we had a good day."
Jane Friedman of International Villa in Cherry Creek is another fan of sterling. She's been selling sterling and using it for decades.
"For me, I love the way it reflects light and makes any table a little more elegant," she says.
And thanks to its durability, silver is an enduring heirloom.
"You can hand it down forever, from generation to generation and people do like that, even the younger ones," Friedman says.
There is a flip side, which tarnishes this sterling image a bit.
Maintenance.
Over time, exposure to air oxidizes and darkens silver, and it then must be polished. Hand washing is also necessary, as the chemicals in dishwasher detergent can damage the finish.
One way to keep up with the upkeep is simple: use your silver on a daily basis. Regular washings elmiminate most of the tarnish, although a small amount is desirable, as it brings out the pattern.
But for many people, any maintenance is too much maintenance.
Modern newlyweds, formerly one of the largest markets for sterling silver, often don't want the upkeep it entails and have caused a slump in sales, according to House & Garden magazine.
At the same time, families made affluent by the robust economy are snapping up designs by Tiffany and Georg Jensen, because only the best will do.
If you are thinking about buying sterling or silverplate flatware, Barbara Thompson offers these tips:
Avoid patterns that can become dated. "I have so many clients who got married in the 1960s when the heavy Mediterranean style was in vogue. Well, that stuff didn't last."
If you're not fussy, don't let someone influence you into buying something that requires fussing. Contemporary styles are hard to maintain, Thompson says. Gleaming flat surfaces can scratch easily and then must be professionally buffed.
Consider purchasing silver patterns that will go well with sets you know you will inherit.
Think about weight. Heavier pieces are easier to hold.
Larger pieces also are easier to hold, she says. This is one reason she prefers Continental silver from Europe.
If you're on a budget, buy older pieces, she says. Visit the World Wide Antique Show, which is held at the Denver Merchandise Mart four times a year.
Thompson also sells heavy European silverplate from her display at The Collection, 899 Broadway. Thirty pieces of heavy silverplate, including forks, spoons and teaspoons, can be purchased for $360.
Continental sets do not come with knives for historic reasons, she adds. Old knives were once made of sheets of sterling filled with resin. They didn't hold up long. So, bone-handled knives with German or English stainless blades were purchased to complete sets.
"You shouldn't get in a panic about having everything absolutely match. The patterns just need to be sympathetic. It's like putting an outfit together," she says.
A word about patterns: The number of contemporary silver patterns can be bewildering, writes Barbara Milo Ohrbach in Tabletops. If you inherited family silver, consider yourself lucky. If you didn't, look for old flatware from the Victorian era, she advises. Since a meal then could have 10 courses, there's plenty of it available. For interest, add fish knives and forks, butter spreaders, and other pieces, Ohrbach recommends. She says silver companies at the turn of the centruy manufactured more than 150 different types of serving pieces, so salad servers and soup ladels also are abundant.
Sterling silver flatware was developed in the 1400s in England and had evolved into a high art by the 17th century. Royalty used full sets of flatware in the 1600s, and European aristocrats followed suit.
In Victorian times, British had elaborate sets of flatware they used to display their wealth.
Eventually, the trend crossed the ocean to America. U.S. flatware got a particular boost in the mid-1800s with the discovery of silver mining lodes in Nevada.
Colorado also was rich in silver, along with its gold. But these days, silver mining is dead.
So says long-time mine expert Bill Kazel of Denver. In fact, when mining for gem stones at one of his operations near Fairplay, he tosses out the silver ore he finds, because it is too expensive to process.
There are also costly environmental factors and regulations. As a result, most silver today is a byproduct of gold mining, he says. Other silver is coming from India, where residents hoarded it for centuries.
Pure silver sells for $5 a ounce.
Today, a four-piece place setting of Reed & Barton's most popular pattern — Francis I — sells for $144 at Denver's International Villa in Cherry Creek. The American company has been producing flatware since 1824 and has created 112 patterns during its 176-year history.
Still, even though pure silver sells for only $5 a ounce, experts will tell you sterling flatware is a good value. A single fork contains roughly $10 worth of pure silver. It takes more than 30 steps to turn this raw material into a utensil.
Raymond Gwozdz, new product coordinator with Reed & Barton, described the process.
Sheets of sterling are delivered to the Reed & Barton factory in Taunton, England, manufactured to a specific width, thickness and temper, depending on the utensil to be made.
Heavy fork "blanks" are cut out of the sterling and are run through rollers numerous times to thin them in places.
The rolled blank is placed in a cookie cutter-like machine that creates the outline of the fork. The tines are also stamped out, but are held in place by a small bar across the top.
The forks are annealed several times during manufacture to resoften the metal and are shaped by various dies. When the final stamping is completed, the flashing from around the fork is trimmed and the piece is sanded and polished. The tines are also shaped and polished.
A series of five or more grease-buffing machines is used to polish a fork. One machine will do the handle, one will do the throat and shoulder area, buffing for one to two minutes per step.
Once the fork is completely polished and sparkling, it is tarnished in an acid bath. This step will help to bring out the pattern details in the final buffing.
Contact Betsy Lehndorff at (303) 892-2792 or lehndorffb@RockyMountainNews.com
December 24, 2000
