Kensington House Antiques and Sterling Silver Kensington House
Antiques
All Items : Vintage Arts : Furnishings : Accessories : Pre 1940 item #1483677
Kensington House Antiques
$235.00
A French Art Deco cocktail pick set in the form of a large chrome snail on a mahogany base. The design is by the famed French Art Deco children’s books illustrator Benjamin Rabier, who had a side job designing entertaining barware. The twelve picks have red bakelite finials that resemble cherries. Cocktail pick holders (“porte-piques”) were once a fixture of every Parisian bar and café. Today, they are used in home bars to spear olives, cherries or onions in a cocktail, or so serve small hors d’eouvres.
  • Origin: France, ca. 1930
  • Condition: excellent, no chrome loss, a tiny bit of scuffing on the wood finish
  • Dimensions: 4-7/8” x 2-1/2” x 4-1/2”
All Items : Vintage Arts : Furnishings : Accessories : Pre 1940 item #1468202
Kensington House Antiques
Sale Pending
A French Art Deco arched chrome cocktail pick holder with a dozen picks with colorful bakelite finials. The holder is French, but the picks (probably early replacements) are marked “Made in England.” This simple design is somewhat easier to use than some of the other figural pick holders. Cocktail pick holders (“porte-piques”) was once a fixture of every French bar or café. Today, they can be used to spear cocktail olives or cherries, or to serve small hors d’oeuvres.
  • Origin: France and England, ca 1930
  • Dimensions: 5-1/4” long x 1-1/2” deep x 3” high.
All Items : Vintage Arts : Furnishings : Accessories : Pre 1950 item #1465964
Kensington House Antiques
$295.00
A colorful orange and white bakelite dice holds a set of six chrome cocktail picks, each with a dice finial in this Art Deco set. The cocktail pick holder (“porte-piques”) was once a fixture of every French bar or café. Today, they can be used to spear cocktail olive or cherries, or to serve small hors d’oeuvres.
  • Origin: France, ca. 1930
  • Condition: excellent
  • Dimensions: 1-1/2” x 1-1/2” x 3-3/4”
All Items : Vintage Arts : Furnishings : Accessories : Pre 1940 item #1412905
Kensington House Antiques
Sale Pending
A French Art Deco cocktail pick set in the unusual form of a large snail accompanied by a pair of baby snails. The snail is usually alone or perhaps with just one smaller one. They are worked in chrome and are set on a mahogany base. The design is by the famed French Art Deco illustrator Benjamin Rabier, who had a side jpb designing entertaining barware. The twelve picks have unusual green bakelite finials. Sets such as this were used on bar and café counters to serve cocktail garnishes, canapés, or even escargot.
  • Origin: France, ca. 1930
  • Condition: excellent; very light wear to wooden edges; all original
  • Dimensions: 7” x 3-1/8” x 4-1/4”.
All Items : Vintage Arts : Furnishings : Accessories : Pre 1940 item #1405765
Kensington House Antiques
$350.00
A French Art Deco cocktail pick set in the form of Gideon the duck and his snail friend worked in chrome on a mahogany base. The design is by the famed French Art Deco illustrator Benjamin Rabier, who created a comic strip called "The Adventures of Gideon" in 1923. It was immensely popular and Rabier was commissioned to make a range of entertaining barware. Few of Rabier's designs were signed, but this example is signed with his full name. The twelve picks have red bakelite finials. Cocktail pick holders ("porte-piques") were once a fixture of every French bar and café. Today, they can be use to spear olives of cherries in a cocktail, or to serve small hors d'oeuvres.
  • Origin: France, ca. 1930.
  • Dimensions: 5 7/16" x 3" x 4 1/2".
  • Condition: very good; a small area of wear to chrome in the folds of the tail feathers and another smaller spot on the underside of the tail; normal age-appropriate wear to the wooden base.
All Items : Vintage Arts : Furnishings : Accessories : Pre 1940 item #1405755
Kensington House Antiques
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A French Art Deco cocktail pick set in the form of a large snail worked in chrome on a mahogany base. The design is by the famed French Art Deco illustrator Benjamin Rabier, who had a side job designing entertaining barware. The twelve picks have red bakelite finials. Cocktail pick holders ("porte-piques") were once a fixture of every French bar and café. Today, they can be use to spear olives of cherries in a cocktail, or to serve small hors d'oeuvres.
  • Origin: France, ca. 1930.
  • Dimensions: 5 3/8” x 2 7/8” x 4 1/2”.
  • Condition: excellent, all original; no chrome loss.
All Items : Vintage Arts : Furnishings : Accessories : Pre 1970 item #1405519
Kensington House Antiques
$195.00
A nice mid-century modern French cocktail pick set featuring a blonde wood stylized snail with a chrome shell. He's perched on a set of chrome leaves that hold the six chrome and plastic-topped cocktail picks. Cocktail pick holders ("porte-piques") were once a fixture of every French bar and café. They can be used to spear olives or cherries for cocktails or to serve small hors d'oeuvres.
  • Origin: France, ca. 1960.
  • Dimensions: 5-1/2" x 2-1/2" x 3-5/8" high.
  • Condition: excellent; tiny amount of chrome wear.
All Items : Vintage Arts : Furnishings : Accessories : Pre 1960 item #1405370
Kensington House Antiques
$135.00
A carved horn cocktail pick set in the form of a flying bird that looks rather like an albatross. The bird has inset glass eyes. The natural coloring of the horn is used to good effect in the bird’s wing and tail feathers. The set is completed with a holder containing ten cocktail picks with horn finials. Cocktail pick holders (“porte-piques”) were once a fixture on the bar of every café in France and were sometimes used in the home as well. Horn sets were popular in the 1950s. Usually made in the Auvergne, the sets were a by-product of the region’s renowned cattle industry. Because the picks have tines, they can be used to spear cherries or olives for cocktails or to serve small hors d’oeuvres.
  • Origin: France, ca. 1950.
  • Dimensions: 7-3/4” x 3-5/8” x 4” high.
  • Condition: excellent; minor flaking at the bottom edge consistent with age and use.
All Items : Vintage Arts : Furnishings : Accessories : Pre 1940 item #1403313
Kensington House Antiques
$225.00
An unusual French Art Deco cocktail pick set featuring a stylized snail carved from beautifully-grained macassar ebony. The snail has a very unusual streamline aerodynamic appearance and colorful phenolic ornaments on the antennae. The set is completed with an ebony and bakelite "basket" holding chrome cocktail picks with multicolored phenolic heads.
  • Origin: France, ca. 1935.
  • Condition: excellent, all original.
  • Dimensions: 6" x 2-1/4" x 3-3/4" high.
All Items : Vintage Arts : Furnishings : Accessories : Pre 1940 item #1403309
Kensington House Antiques
$395.00
A delightful French Art Deco cocktail pick set in the form of a carved rosewood cat arching his back to hiss at a little chrome snail. A wooden rack holds six chrome cocktail picks, each topped with a snail. All are presented on a macassar ebony base. Sets such as these were used in French homes as well as on the bar counters at cafes.
  • Origin: France, ca. 1935.
  • Condition: excellent, all original, one pick has very minor plating wear visible on close inspection.
  • Dimensions: 5-7/8" x 3-1/4" x 4" high.
All Items : Vintage Arts : Furnishings : Accessories : Pre 1940 item #1402068
Kensington House Antiques
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A French Art Deco cocktail pick set in the unusual form of a large snail accompanied by a pair of baby snails. The snail is usually alone or perhaps with just one smaller one. They are worked in chrome and are set on a mahogany base. The design is by the famed French Art Deco illustrator Benjamin Rabier, who had a side gig designing entertaining barware. The twelve picks have red bakelite finials. Sets such as this were used on bar and café counters to serve cocktail garnishes, canapés, or even escargot.
  • Origin: France, ca. 1930.
  • Condition: excellent; all original.
  • Dimensions: 6-7/8” x 3-1/8” x 4-1/4”.
All Items : Vintage Arts : Furnishings : Accessories : Pre 1950 item #1400649
Kensington House Antiques
$350.00
A wonderful French Art Deco cocktail pick set featuring a Scottie dog (Scottish terrier) carved from Indonesian Macassar ebony. The severely linear carving of the dog is nicely accented by the natural markings of the wood. The dog has inlaid white eyes. The set is completed with eleven cocktail picks topped with colorful orbs. This set could certainly be used for olives or cherries in a cocktail, but could also be used as food picks for hors d'oeuvres.
  • Origin: France, ca. 1930.
  • Condition: excellent; no cracking to wood; one blue pick missing.
  • Dimensions: 5-1/2" x 3-1/8" x 3-1/2" tall.
All Items : Vintage Arts : Furnishings : Accessories : Pre 1940 item #1396355
Kensington House Antiques
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A French Art Deco cocktail pick set in the form a wishing well. A water bucket hangs from the winch and six red bakelite-topped cocktail picks are stored in the well itself. The The whole is set on a Macassar ebony base. Sets such as this were used on bar and café counters to serve cocktail garnishes, canapés or even escargot.
  • Origin: France, ca. 1930.
  • Condition: good; typical wear to bakelite spheres; no rust; one metal stem seems to have been cut off just above the bakelite "cherr".
  • Dimensions: 5-3/4” tall.
All Items : Vintage Arts : Furnishings : Accessories : Boxes : Pre 1950 item #1369763
Kensington House Antiques
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A brilliant red transparent lucite jewelry box or dresser box, the hinged lid inset with a sterling silver medallion illustrating a pair of lovebirds. The interior of the lid has a small round mirror. The medallion is stamped "Sterling" and has a design patent number registered in 1945.
  • Origin: America, ca. 1945
  • Condition: excellent
  • Dimensions: 4-3/4" x 3-15/16" x 1-3/4"
All Items : Vintage Arts : Furnishings : Accessories : Boxes : Pre 1960 item #1339915
Kensington House Antiques
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A nice vintage leather box embossed “Studs” on the top. Most of these boxes are round, but this example is a much more uncommon horseshoe, the lid also embossed with a horseshoe. These boxes were original intended to store shirt studs or cufflinks, but can be used for any variety of gentleman’s accessories.

Origin: probably England, ca. 1950. Condition: excellent. Dimensions: 2-1/2” x 2-3/4” x 1-3/16.

All Items : Vintage Arts : Furnishings : Accessories : Pre 1930 item #1339405
Kensington House Antiques
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A very handsome Art Deco champagne and cocktail stirrer set of imposing size. Each stirrer has a torpedo-shaped finial complete with fins. The stirrers would be inserted with finial down for aerating a glass of champagne or with the thin end down for stirring a cocktail. The underside of the base is stamped the hallmark of B. Borhmann, a silverplate manufacturer in Frankfurt Germany until the mid-1920s. This set has the streamline, machine-age look of the best German Deco design.

Origin: Germany, ca. 1920. Condition: excellent; minute plating wear. Dimensions: 10” tall; stirrers, 6-3/4”.

All Items : Vintage Arts : Furnishings : Accessories : Pre 1930 item #1339330
Kensington House Antiques
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A very uncommon French Art Deco cocktail pick set in the form of a fisherman navigating his boat. A dozen picks, each topped with a red bakelite ball form oars along the sides of the boat. The whole is attached to the original wooden base.

Origin: France, ca 1925. Condition: excellent; very minor spotting to the plating on the interior of the boat. Dimensions: 8" long.

All Items : Vintage Arts : Furnishings : Accessories : Pre 1900 item #1334582
Kensington House Antiques
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A very fine 19th century Imperial Russian wooden Easter egg with polychrome decoration of Christ Pantocrator in the traditional double gesture of blessing and teaching. The figure, especially the face, is beautifully detailed. The back side of the egg bears the gilt letters "XB" for "Christ is Risen." The egg is completed with its original ribbon, appropriately brittle with age. Careful examination of the drill holes in the egg show even oxidation of the wood's unpainted surfaces and the paint has typical aligatoring, consistent with a 19th century date.

Origin: Russia, ca. 1880. Condition: very good; some losses to paint at the upper and middle left of the background around the Christ figure. Dimensions: 2-5/8" long (excluding ribbon).