Object Description
This is a wonderful antique coromandel and cut card brass casket shaped stationary box by Howell James & Co, circa 1860 in date.
It bears the brass label of the highly sought after jewellers and silversmiths Howell James & Co. of Regent Street, London.
This delightful box has a hinged and domed lid and features engraved cut brass mounts with porcelain plaques painted with flowers which opens to reveal a fitted interior with five compartments for pens, pencils and letters.
This is a highly decorative set which will make a statement once placed on any period desk.
Complete with paperwork about the maker, Howell James.
Condition:
In excellent original untouched condition – please see photos for confirmation.
Dimensions in cm:
Height 17 cm x Width 23 cm x Depth 12.5 cm
Dimensions in inches:
Height 7 inches x Width 9 inches x Depth 5 inches
Howell James & Company – were a firm of jewellers and silversmiths, based in Regent Street in London, which operated between 1819 and 1911.
The firm Howell and James was founded in 1819 by James Howell and Isaac James who were originally silk mercers and retail jewellers. The company had premises at 5, 7 and 9 Regent Street and was noted for the variety and quality of its stock. In 1838 James left the business and the partnership then became known as Howell James & Co. By 1865 the firm employed over 140 women, most of whom lived above the shop.
The firm exhibited in London, at the Great Exhibition in 1851 and at the 1862 International Exhibition, and in Paris and the International Exposition of 1867. It sold items by students and designers of the South Kensington School.
At the London exhibitions of 1871 and 1872 the company exhibited jewellery by C.L. Eastlake, M. D. Wyatt, F. Leighton and L. F. Day. The company’s 1878 Paris Exhibition stand was designed by Day. In 1889, company employee J. Llewellyn moved to Liberty & Co taking with him exclusive selling rights.
In 1881 the premises were reconstructed and these incorporated art pottery galleries. An exhibition was staged, of architectural faience, produced to the designs of M. B. Adams by of Burmantofts.
In 1884 the company became a limited company and their name changed to Howell & James Ltd.
Coromandel wood or Calamander wood
is a valuable wood from India, Sri Lanka and South East Asia. It is of a hazel-brown colour, with black stripes (or the other way about), very heavy and hard. It is also known as Macassar Ebony or variegated ebony and is closely related to genuine ebony, but is obtained from different species in the same genus; one of these is Diospyros quaesita Thwaites, from Sri Lanka. The name Calamander comes from the local Sinhalese name, ‘Kalu-Medhiriya’, which means dark chamber; referring to the characteristic ebony black wood.
Coromandel wood has been logged to extinction over the last 2 to 3 hundred years and is no longer available for new work in any quantity. Furniture in coromandel is so expensive and so well looked after that even recycling it is an unlikely source. A substitute, Macassar Ebony, has similar characteristics and to the untrained eye is nearly the same but it lacks the depth of colour seen in genuine Coromandel.
Our reference: A5020