Antique English Hand Painted Service Plates Set of Eight

Tiffany & Co. is one of the most prominent purveyors of luxury goods in the United States, and has long been an important arbiter of style in the design of diamond engagement rings. A young Franklin Delano Roosevelt proposed to his future wife, Eleanor, with a Tiffany ring in 1904. Vanderbilts, Whitneys, Astors and members of the Russian imperial family all wore Tiffany & Co. jewelry. And Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis preferred Tiffany china for state dinners at the White House.

Although synonymous with luxury today, the firm started out rather modestly. Charles Lewis Tiffany and John B. Young founded it in Connecticut as a “stationery and fancy goods emporium” in 1837, at a time when European imports still dominated the nascent American luxury market. In 1853, Charles Tiffany — who in 1845 had launched the company’s famed catalog, the Blue Book, and with it, the firm’s signature robin’s-egg blue, which he chose for the cover — shifted the focus to fine jewelry.

In 1868, Tiffany & Co. gained international recognition when it became the first U.S. firm to win an award for excellence in silverware at the Exposition Universelle in Paris. From then on, it belonged to the pantheon of American luxury brands.

At the start of the Gilded Age, in 1870, Tiffany & Co. opened its flagship store, described as a "palace of jewels" by the New York Times, at 15 Union Square West in Manhattan. Throughout this period, its designs for silver tableware, ceremonial silver, flatware and jewelry were highly sought-after indicators of status and taste. They also won the firm numerous accolades, including the grand prize for silverware at the Paris Exposition of 1878. Among the firm’s glittering creations from this time are masterworks of Art Nouveau jewelry, such as this delicate aquamarine necklace and this lavish plique-à-jour peridot and gold necklace, both circa 1900.

When Charles Lewis Tiffany died, in 1902, his son Louis Comfort Tiffany became the firm’s design director. Under his leadership, the Tiffany silver studio was a de facto design school for apprentice silversmiths, who worked alongside head artisan Edward C. Moore. The firm produced distinctive objects inspired by Japanese art and design, North American plants and flowers, and Native American patterns and crafts, adding aesthetic diversity to Tiffany & Co.’s distinguished repertoire.

Tiffany is also closely associated with diamonds, even lending its name to one particularly rare and exceptional yellow stone. The firm bought the Tiffany diamond in its raw state from the Kimberley mines of South Africa in 1878. Cut to create a 128.54-carat gem with an unprecedented 82 facets, it is one of the most spectacular examples of a yellow diamond in the world.

In a broader sense, Tiffany & Co. helped put diamonds on the map in 1886 by introducing the American marketplace to the solitaire diamond design, which is still among the most popular engagement-ring styles. The trademark Tiffany® Setting raises the stone above the band on six prongs, allowing its facets to catch the light. A lovely recent example is this circa-2000 platinum engagement ring. Displaying a different design and aesthetic (but equally chic) is this exquisite diamond and ruby ring from the 1930s.

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Steeped in British history and tradition, the name Copeland Spode is renowned among porcelain collectors for its fine-quality bone china and earthenware pieces. With its roots in Spode — one of the oldest and most distinguished of the great pottery companies of Staffordshire, the time-honored home of English ceramics — Copeland Spode is known to pottery enthusiasts for some of the most timeless and recognizable patterns produced in 19th and early 20th-century porcelain manufacturing such as Wicker Lane, Chinese Rose and Tower. Collectors regard Copeland-marked pieces as Spode china.

The story of Copeland Spode china began in 1770 when English potter Josiah Spode founded a pottery and homewares company called Spode in Stoke-on-Trent, England. Within fifteen years, the manufacturer became known for its signature blue-on-white palette, and one of the company’s designers developed a specific cobalt hue for their teapots, trays, bowls and more. Spode’s founder was particularly revered for two technical achievements in the firm’s early decades. The first was to develop a standard formula for the making of bone china — a type of porcelain (made with a mixture of bone ash, minerals and clay) that is dazzlingly white and so strong it can be used to create very thin translucent plates and vessels. The other was to perfect the making of transferware.

In 1833, entrepreneurs William Taylor Copeland (the Lord Mayor of London at the time) and Thomas Garrett purchased Spode’s pottery-making company following the death of Josiah Spode III, and the name was changed to Copeland Spode. Then, in 1847, Copeland became the firm’s sole owner and the name changed again, this time to W. T. Copeland and Sons, in 1867 when Copeland retired and his four sons took over the business. 

Trading as W. T. Copeland and Sons throughout the mid-to-late 19th century, the company found a formidable competitor in another well-known porcelain maker, Minton. Many of the manufacturer’s Georgian, Rococo and late-Victorian pieces such as its dinner plates, tableware, platters, bowls and baskets were commissioned by wealthy British and European clients and exported for sale throughout the British Empire and to the United States. Several of W. T. Copeland and Sons’ spectacular pieces were exhibited at the Great Exhibition of London in 1851 and the International Exhibitions of London and Paris in 1862 and 1878, respectively.

In addition to their exceptional quality and design, the company’s ceramics were particularly prized for their intricate patterns which featured a variety of colors. For instance, its popular Tower pattern was available in a pale ultramarine blue, a darker Royal Saxon blue, rose pink, brown and green. 

The company continued as W. T. Copeland and Sons until 1970 when Spode again became the brand's name. Afterward, during the late 1970s, Spode, Royal Worcester and Palissy came under common ownership. In 2009, the firm was purchased by the Portmeirion Group. However, the Spode and Royal Worcester names continue to flourish as highly popular “traditional English heritage” brands within the Portmeirion company.

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