Three-Piece Tea Set with Tray

Arts of the Americas

1928

Designed by Jean George Theobald (American, active 1920s-30s)
Manufactured by Wilcox Silver Plate Company (American, 1867–1961), a division of International Silver Company
(American, founded 1898)
Meriden, Connecticut

The rise in apartment living in the 1920s created a need for smaller decorative objects such as this tea service, which could be easily cleaned and stored. Jean G. Theobald was hired by the Wilcox Silver Plate Company (a subsidiary of the International Silver Company) to produce a series of tea sets. Theobald’s imaginative, compact design is based on geometric shapes and combines the traditional elements of a tea service with the clean, simple lines and smooth surfaces of the Art Deco style.

Status: Currently Off View
Department: Arts of the Americas

Artist: Gene Theobald (Designer)
Title: Three-Piece Tea Set with Tray
Place: Meriden (Object made in)
Date Dates are not always precisely known, but the Art Institute strives to present this information as consistently and legibly as possible. Dates may be represented as a range that spans decades, centuries, dynasties, or periods and may include qualifiers such as c. (circa) or BCE.: 1928
Medium: Silver-plated nickel, silver, and Bakelite
Inscriptions: Marked on bottom: Wilcox S.P. Company [in an arch] / EPNS / INTERNATIONAL S. CO. / 7036
Dimensions: 8.9 × 21.6 × 20.3 cm (3 1/2 × 8 1/2 × 8 in.)
Credit Line: Bannerman Foundation Fund; through prior acquisition of Elizabeth R. Vaughan
Reference Number: 1999.680.1-4

Jennifer M. Downs, “ ‘The New Modern Feeling’: A Catalogue of the Collection,” Art Institute of Chicago Museum Studies 27, 2 (2001), 39–41, cat. 9.
Judith A. Barter, Elizabeth McGoey, et al., American Silver in the Art Institute of Chicago (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2016), cat. 87 (ill.).
Elizabeth McGoey, ed., American Silver in the Art Institute of Chicago (Chicago: Art Institute of Chicago, 2018), https://publications.artic.edu/americansilver/reader/collection/section/6, cat. 87 (ill.).

With Historical Design, Inc., New York, by 1999; sold to the Art Institute of Chicago, 1999.

Cat. 87 Three-Piece Tea Set with Tray, 1928

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Date Dates are not always precisely known, but the Art Institute strives to present this information as consistently and legibly as possible. Dates may be represented as a range that spans decades, centuries, dynasties, or periods and may include qualifiers such as c. (circa) or BCE.

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