Box engraving on the lid and hand-painted floral miniature Salimbeni

Shaped snuffbox in 925/1000 sterling silver gold plated with perforated, embossed and hand-engraved lid, with fine oval miniature cm. 3.2 x 4.5 hand painted in tempera on vegetable i...

Square box in 925/1000 sterling silver gold plated with translucent fired enamel on guillochè also on the sides. In the center, a beautiful hand painted tempera miniature on a vegetable ivory plate depicting the portrait of a 19th century lady, signed by the painter Anna Maria Manfriani. Dimensions cm. 12 x 12 x 2.5. Weight gr. 618. Designed by Franco Salimbeni in 1976 and manufactured in Florence in some 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...

Box shaped enamel is in 925/1000 sterling. Box shaped enamel has handpainted fired enamels miniature. Box shaped enamel is engraved and fire-enamelled ornaments. Box shaped enamel is...

Rectangular table box in sterling silver 925/1000 gold plated with very fine hand-engraving Baroque style on the lid, fire-enamelled in 2 colours. In the center an ancient oval plate...

Rectangular table box with concave corners in 925/1000 sterling silver gold plated with translucent fired enamel on fine hand engraving of a landscape with ruins. Contemporary modern...

Shaped snuff box in 925/1000 sterling silver gold plated with fire-enameled stripes and fine oval enameled miniature in center cm. 3 x 4 hand-painted by ...

Round haped silver gilded 925/1000 table box with translucent enamels on guilloche with hand-painted floral miniatures and gold paillons Made in Italy 1.400 grams The Miniatures are hand-painted on a usually white homogeneous enamel base. The same colored glazes are used, but ground much finer, which are mixed with special oils to form an infinite palette of colors. The paint must be gradually dried on electric stoves...

A rare and highly sought-after sterling silver money box or bank, the like of which I have never seen before. The box is made from English sterling...

A fantastic and rare, novelty, antique sterling silver tobacco tin or box. It has been designed as an empty tin can, very realistically detailed and similar in size to a regular f...

Art Deco, sterling silver table box with hinged lid, New Jersey, Ca. 1935, Becht and Hartl - makers. Wood lined. Edge of hinged lid has a beaded border. Measures 6 1/2 inches wide x ...

Alessandria, Italy An extremely unusual and decorative silver pineapple-form lidded box, or perhaps can be used as a personal bucket for ice cubes, w...

Hallmarked in London in 1905 by William Comyns, this very attractive, Edwardian, Antique Sterling Silver Jewellery Box, features Neoclassical style decoration throughout, and is line...