R. Louis Bofferding Decorative and Fine Art Natural Specimens

These charming bronze shells were cast in Japan in the 19th century. They lived for many years in the collection of the Paris artist Pierre Le-Tan. One of...

In the 1920s Gio Ponti, who defined 20th century Italian design, was the art director of Richard-Ginori, a venerable porcelain company established in the 18th century. When Ponti moved on in 1930, his protégé Giovanni Gariboldi, who also designed furniture and interiors, filled the vacated position. It would seem that Gariboldi found his model for these shell-shaped dishes in nature, but this is not the case. Rather, he channeled the essence of “shellness," and endowed his design with the faux verisimilitude of delicate ribbing along the scalloped edge. Yet he had them glazed in improbable candy-like pastel colors of pink, yellow, and blue. Originally used principally as ashtrays, no doubt, they could also be put to use as serving dishes for nuts and candies, or as decorative tabletop objects...

These 31 Brazilian amulets, or balangada, were hammered from sheets of silver in the 19th century to form pomegranates, sugar apples, guava, and other...

The verisimilitude of this pin to a leaf may be the result of its actually having been cast from one. But the unobtrusive nib at the end of the gently curving stem, by which the pin ...