Vintage Wednesday: What is it?

Here's another piece used by Victorians to set an elaborate table. Some say it was used as a symbol of hospitality, others say it was used as a status symbol. It can be confused with an open sugar, a sugar bottom, a celery vase or even a tumbler. It's called a spooner.

A spooner was used to hold silver spoons - which probably gave rise to the idea that it was a status symbol since some couldn't afford silver spoons. It seems that spooners were often sold as part of a breakfast set: creamer, sugar, butter dish and spooner. Spooners are generally 4 to 6 inches tall with a beaded or serrated top edge. Tumblers are usually shorter and narrower and celery vases are generally much taller.

Spooners can be made of glass, silver or other metals and even ceramics. The glass spooners can be found in Jadite, Flow Blue and even carnival glass.

I've also read that a spooner evolved from what's called a "spill holder." A spill, splint or taper was used to light stoves, candles or pipes in the 1700s and early 1800s. But as matches became more readily available, the spill holder evolved into the spooner for the Victorian table.

Whatever the history, I've enjoyed my little spooner as it now holds my most prized silver spoons. I especially like it because the swans make me want to Swoon....

Vintage Wednesday: What does this do?

You're poking around an antique store and you find a little pile of tiny plates. Could they be part of a child's tea set? Possibly. But if they match a corresponding set of china, it's more likely they're an individual butter plate - sometimes called a butter pat or a butter chip. The plate is usually about 3 inches in diameter with some type of motif on it. They were used (and sometimes are still used internationally) in a formal table setting to hold individual pats of butter - placed in the upper left corner of the place setting.

You might think these were part of the explosion of china in the Victorian period - we've discussed before how those Victorians loved their china and created pieces to satisfy every possible food combination - but it seems butter pats were actually popular throughout the 1800s. Staffordshire potteries made English butter pats readily available. However, the king of butter pat production is reputed to be Haviland who is estimated to have produced over 60,000 patterns with matching butter pats.

Collecting butter pats has apparently exploded in recent years and they can be easily found on ebay or Ruby Lane if you're interested in starting a collection of your own. The variety of colors and patterns will certainly satisfy even the most picky of collectors. So the next time you pass by one of these tiny plates, you'll know: That's a butter pat!

What is it Wednesday?

Somewhere around the 1870s through about 1940 there was a silver and china revolution in America. Americans in the Victorian era were especially enamored with setting a beautiful table. They demanded china and silver that would accommodate every conceivable meal that could be served. There were social conventions that dictated the furnishing of a dining room that often included a rich color, a heavy buffet and/or sideboard with silver on display and a "lavishly appointed table that riveted attention."

Most of us set our table (if you even eat at a table anymore) with a knife, fork and spoon. If we're setting a formal table we might include a salad fork and dessert utensils. The Victorian table, however, had oyster forks, fruit knives, ice cream forks, cream soup or bouillon spoons, fish knives and fish forks, not to mention berry bowls and knife rests and finger bowls and salt cellars. I've read that some silver flatware lines offered up to 100 different types of pieces especially for a hostesses "lavishly appointed table."

This piece is one of the many offerings that probably first became popular in the Victorian era. It's called a hooded asparagus server - not to be confused with asparagus tongs! If you were a well-equipped hostess it would have been used with a special china plate made to serve asparagus.

Did you guess correctly?