Design for a silver salt cellar by Edward Hodges Baily (1788- 1867) c.1820

A drawing of a silver salt cellar by Edward Hodges Baily, circa 1820
The bowl in the shape of a shell borne up by three tritons. The base with Vitruvian scrolls on ball feet.
Profile, Full size, 135 x 155 mm.

A set of 36 silver gilt salts to this design are in the Grand Service in the Royal Collection, marked by Paul Storr hallmarked 1813-14 (RCIN 51262).
The similarities between this design and E.114-1964 suggest that the original design is by William Theed the Elder.
The sculptor William Theed the Elder (1764- 1817) worked as a modeller and designer for Rundell, Bridge and Rundell from least 1809 untill his death.

This design is on folio 22 verso included in an album containing 55 designs drawn directly on 27 sheets (sometimes several to a page), for gold and silver plate, including wine-coolers, tureens, inkstands, a teapot, a kettle, candelabra etc., related to the production of the Royal goldsmiths Rundell, Bridge and Rundell between c.1809 and c.1820. (E.70- 124-1964) The album pages are of white wove paper watermarked 1806, full-bound in blue leather, gold tooled, lettered on the spine ‘Designs for Plate etc. by John Flaxman’. With the bookplate of John Roland Abbey (1894 –1969). Bound by William Wood. The back fly- leaf is inscribed “JA, 1070/ 13:9:1935”. All the drawings are by one hand, most probably that of the sculptor Edward Hodges Baily. He became a pupil of John Flaxman in 1807, at a time when Flaxman was designing silver for Rundell, Bridge and Rundell. He joined Rundell Bridge and Rundell in 1815 as “a modeller and designer” and in 1826 became its chief modeller and designer. In 1833 he began working for the firm of Storr and Mortimer. Some of the drawings are most probably copies by Baily of his own designs, while others are copied or adapted from designs by John Flaxman and Thomas Stothard, as well as other, anonymous, designers. The clean condition of the album, and the range of dates of the pieces shown, in addition to their unchronological arrangement, suggest that the album was made as a fair-copy record of pre-existing design drawings, all made about 1820, although some of the drawings seem also have been used as part of a design process. The drawings copied from John Flaxman and Thomas Stothard imitate the graphic styles of the originals. The album was bought from Marlborough Rare Books on 24th March 1964 for 550 pounds.

E.115-1964