Carved Sterling Silver

Round table box in 925/1000 sterling silver gold plated with fired enamels, with “paillons” in pure gold on the upper circle, fine floral miniature fired enamelled by the painter Ren...

Large rectangular table box with long rounded sides in 925/1000 sterling silver with fire-enamelled stripes in Art Deco style. With “lost” hinge, i.e. semi-invisible. Dimensions cm. 10.5 x 15 x 2.3. Weight gr. 548. Inspired by drawings by Louis Cartier from the early 1900s in Art Deco style and recreated for Cartier USA in the 1980s, manufactured in Florence in the Salimbeni company headquarters with completely manual execution by artisan artists with thick and thick slabs reinforcements suitable for supporting numerous high-fire enamelled firings at about 800° C. About cooperation Salimbeni and Cartier. Our first meetings with the Cartier USA Company took place through the Giorgini Company, the first "Buying Office" set up in Florence immediately after the Second World War, which had the purpose of bringing together Florentine, and also Italian, producers with American buyers, who especially appreciated the artistic objects still manufactured by artisans who still took inspiration from the Italian Renaissance, using techniques handed down from generation to generation. Mrs. Gina Pestelli, wife of a Florentine retail jeweller, was in charge of contacts with Cartier USA, above all an employee, while her daughter, also for Giorgini, took care of the fashion that in those years was affirmed in Florence with the events of "Pitti ". With their help, we began to supply frames and boxes in sterling silver gold plated with malachite and other semi-precious stones. At the same time, the official buyer of Cartier, Mr. William Smith, began to appreciate and commission the first objects with fired enamels, a process of which we have always been specialists. In 1975 we began exhibiting at the prestigious New York Jewellery Association Show, which we participated in both the February and July editions, for a good 26 years until 2001. In New York in those years the "Art deco style" was still very much appreciated, still mindful of the beautiful early 20th century architecture of the great buildings such as the "Crysler" or the "Empire State". We then began to produce frames, boxes, evening bags, "objets de vertu" and other objects in "art deco style" which were very popular with Mr. Smith who gave us some photocopies of Louis Francois Cartier drawings to reproduce them. Thus, numerous cigarette cases, powder compacts, evening bags, frames and table boxes were created exclusively for Cartier USA which, at the time, had the prestigious "Silver Department" on the first floor of the Cartier store on Fifth Avenue. An evening bag, with matching cigarette case and powder compact, were redone on the design created for a gift given to Mary Pickford at the time. In a 1986 Cartier catalogue...

Perfume holder pendant in the shape of a cruet in 925/1000 sterling silver gold plated with screwed cap and branch with ivy leaves engraved and fire enameled on both sides. Art Nouve...

Perfume Holder Pendant in the shape of a cruet in 925/1000 sterling silver gold-plated with screwed cap and translucent enamel fired on guilloche. Art Nouveau style from the early 19...

Large shaped photograph frame in gold plated 925/1000 sterling silver with translucent fired enamel on guillochè with borders and laurel frieze in Louis XVI French Empire style. Exte...

Large shaped frame for photographs in gold plated 925/1000 sterling silver with translucent two-tone fired enamels on guillochè and rich friezes in the French Empire Louis XVI style ...

Large gold-plated 925/1000 sterling silver shaped photograph frame with translucent fired enamel on guillochè and rich friezes in Louis XVI French Empire style. External measurements...

Rare and one of a kind important Mario Buccellati clutch. Gold, silver and carved Emeralds evening bag, The silver bag engraved in a sunburst-like Pattern, the clasp set with 11 carv...

Round table box in 925/1000 sterlin silver gold plated with fired enamels, with “paillons” in pure gold on the upper circle, fine fired enamelled miniature with hand-painted floral i...

Rectangular table box with rounded corners in 925/1000 sterling silver brossè with very fine hand engraving, also on the sides, of “ramage” with leaves and bunches of grapes fire-ena...

Rectangular photo frame in 925/1000 sterling silver gold plated with translucent fired enamels on guillochè and internal striped border with French Empire Louis XVI style interweavin...

Baroque style shaped table box in 925/1000 sterling silver gold plated with fine hand engraving interspersed with spaces with translucent fired enamels on guillochè and a beautiful h...

Shaped frame for 2 photographs in sterling Silver 925/1000 gold plated with translucent fired enamels on guillochè and hand-painted floral miniatures. Viennese Art Nouveau style seco...

Rectangular table cigarette case with rounded corners in sterling silver 925/1000 gold plated with beautiful miniature fire enamelled and hand painted by the painter Beatrice Mellana reproducing a "still life" by the Flemish painter Willem Claes Heda. Dimensions cm. 5.7 x 9 x 1.7. Weight gr. 174. Designed by Franco Salimbeni in 1969 and manufactured in Florence in numerous specimens with various subjects and different colors, in the headquarters of the Salimbeni Company with completely manual execution by artisan artists with thick slab and large reinforcements suitable for withstanding numerous enamelled firings at about 800° C. Miniature is a very ancient technique which consists of painting works in small proportions. It was born for the decoration of the first letter of the paragraph of the books. Over the years, however, this technique is refined and enriched, then moving on to precious personal items. Hand-painted miniatures can be done with multiple different techniques. The most important that we use on our articles are of three kinds: 1) Fire enamel. 2) Water tempera on an ivory plate. 3) Painted on mother-of-pearl. Fire enameled miniatures: On a first layer of enamel generally white or very clear or even transparent suitably liquefied at a temperature of about 750 ° C, the chosen subject is painted using miniature colors which are as many colored crystals, ground and reduced to a very fine, almost impalpable powder washed and purified in distilled water with the addition of small quantities of deoxidizing acids which, diluted with essential oils (usually essential oil of solder), can be mixed to form a palette of colors. With very fine sable hair brushes you draw the subject starting from the perimeter and then gradually adding various layers of color. It is necessary to carry out various firings very often so that the colors harden and are not absorbed by the underlying glaze as, during the subsequent firings at 750 ° C, during liquefaction, it would spread irremediably. Hence the need to form the painting a little at a time, cooking it numerous times. Therefore it is necessary to proceed with numerous retouching, often overlapping different colors that only the painter's experience knows. A beautiful miniature needs from 20 to over 50 firings and is finished when the painter deems he does not have to further intervene. Some colors must have darker tones than others because then, by superimposing the transparent enamel placed at the end of the miniature, they fade. This transparent layer, called “fondant” in jargon, must be smoothed and polished like all other translucent enamel colors. The miniatures with water tempera colors are painted on real ivory...

table box in sterling silver 925/1000 gold plated with edges with fire - enamelled stripes and upper frame with insertion of paillons in pure gold and beautRectangular iful fire-enam...

Rectangular box with inward corners in sterling silver 925/1000 gold plated with beautiful miniature fire enameled and hand painted by the painter Beatrice Mellana depicting the painting "The Turkish slave" by Francesco Mazzola known as "il Parmigianino" (National Gallery of Parma). Dimensions cm. 8.5 x 11.5 x 3. Weight gr. 345. Designed by Franco Salimbeni in 1965 and manufactured in Florence in numerous specimens with various different subjects, in the headquarters of the Salimbeni company with completely manual execution by artisan artists with thick slab and large reinforcements suitable for withstanding numerous high-fire enameled firings at about 800° C. Miniature is a very ancient technique which consists of painting works in small proportions. It was born for the decoration of the first letter of the paragraph of the books. Over the years, however, this technique is refined and enriched, then moving on to precious personal items. Hand-painted miniatures can be done with multiple different techniques. The most important that we use on our articles are of three kinds: 1) Fire enamel. 2) Water tempera on an ivory plate. 3) Painted on mother-of-pearl. Fire enameled miniatures: On a first layer of enamel generally white or very clear or even transparent suitably liquefied at a temperature of about 750 ° C, the chosen subject is painted using miniature colors which are as many colored crystals, ground and reduced to a very fine, almost impalpable powder washed and purified in distilled water with the addition of small quantities of deoxidizing acids which, diluted with essential oils (usually essential oil of solder), can be mixed to form a palette of colors. With very fine sable hair brushes you draw the subject starting from the perimeter and then gradually adding various layers of color. It is necessary to carry out various firings very often so that the colors harden and are not absorbed by the underlying glaze as, during the subsequent firings at 750 ° C, during liquefaction, it would spread irremediably. Hence the need to form the painting a little at a time, cooking it numerous times. Therefore it is necessary to proceed with numerous retouching, often overlapping different colors that only the painter's experience knows. A beautiful miniature needs from 20 to over 50 firings and is finished when the painter deems he does not have to further intervene. Some colors must have darker tones than others because then, by superimposing the transparent enamel placed at the end of the miniature, they fade. This transparent layer, called “fondant” in jargon, must be smoothed and polished like all other translucent enamel colors. The miniatures with water tempera colors are painted on real ivory...

Rounded rectangular snuffbox in 925/1000 sterling silver gold plated with beautiful fire enamelled miniature hand painted by the painter Simone Dainelli inspired by the paintings of Boris Vallejo, in fantastic contemporary style, with hand-engraved frame. Designed by Franco Salimbeni in 1967 and manufactured in Florence in numerous specimens with various subjects and different colors, in the headquarters of the Salimbeni company with completely manual execution by artisan artists with thick slab and large reinforcements suitable for withstanding numerous high-fire enamelled firings at about 800° C. Miniature is a very ancient technique which consists of painting works in small proportions. It was born for the decoration of the first letter of the paragraph of the books. Over the years, however, this technique is refined and enriched, then moving on to precious personal items. hand painted miniatures can be done with multiple different techniques. The most important that we use on our articles are of three kinds: 1) Fire enamel. 2) Water tempera on an ivory plate. 3) Painted on mother-of-pearl. Fire enameled miniatures: On a first layer of enamel generally white or very clear or even transparent suitably liquefied at a temperature of about 750 ° C, the chosen subject is painted using miniature colors which are as many colored crystals, ground and reduced to a very fine, almost impalpable powder washed and purified in distilled water with the addition of small quantities of deoxidizing acids which, diluted with essential oils (usually essential oil of solder), can be mixed to form a palette of colors. With very fine sable hair brushes you draw the subject starting from the perimeter and then gradually adding various layers of color. It is necessary to carry out various firings very often so that the colors harden and are not absorbed by the underlying glaze as, during the subsequent firings at 750 ° C, during liquefaction, it would spread irremediably. Hence the need to form the painting a little at a time, cooking it numerous times. Therefore it is necessary to proceed with numerous retouching, often overlapping different colors that only the painter's experience knows. A beautiful miniature needs from 20 to over 50 firings and is finished when the painter deems he does not have to further intervene. Some colors must have darker tones than others because then, by superimposing the transparent enamel placed at the end of the miniature, they fade. This transparent layer, called “fondant” in jargon, must be smoothed and polished like all other translucent enamel colors. The miniatures with water tempera colors are painted on real ivory...

Rectangular oval shape pocket snuffbox in 925/1000 sterling silver gold plated with translucent blue fired enamel on guillochè and with the insertion of p...

Rectangular photo frame in 925/1000 sterling silver gold plated with translucent blue fired enamel on guillochè and with the insertion of pure gold "paillons" in the shape of stars t...

Oval table box in 925/1000 sterling silver gold plated with fired enamel, with “paillons” in pure gold on the upper circle, fine miniature fired enamelled with an image of “fox hunti...

Buccellati silver Seahorse ice bucket large in 800 silver. Buccellati silver Seahorse ice bucket often used to chill multiple bottles of wine, champ...

Buccellati silver sea motif champagne bucket in sterling silver. Buccellati champagne bucket, featuring motifs of the sea. Raised vessel in sterling silve...