Thai Silver Teaset

Three Piece Silver Teaset by FW Margrett

This three-piece, finely executed silver tea set comes from the early days of interaction between Western entrepreneurs and local Thai craftspeople in the manner of Jim Thompson, the expatriate American who developed the Thai silk industry. Each piece is engraved to the base with a logo and in gothic script the words ‘ FW Margrett / Craftsman / Bangkok’.

FW Margrett was a firm founded in Bangkok in the early twentieth century by an Englishman of the same name. Bangkok-made items were also retailed by the firm in Singapore during the 1930s.

Each piece is finely chased with typically Thai motifs. Each is chased either side with a

norasingh, a mythical forest-dwelling semi-deity from Thai Buddhist cosmology with a human head, torso, and arms but with the hind-quarters of a lion and the tail and hoofs of a deer. The teapot also is decorated with a thepanom figure beneath the spout. Thepanoms are nymph-like beings also from Thai Buddhist cosmology. The remainder of the sides of each piece are chased with Thai flame motifs (lai kranok krue tao) within floral lai na kradan borders.

Each piece sits on a flared foot chased with lotus petal (lai bua) motifs. The hinged lid of the teapot is fabulously decorated with heaped lotus petal and other floral motifs and finished with a lotus bud finial.

Each is fitted with stained wooden handles that emerge from cast silver bamboo shoots. The sugar bowl and milk jug both are gilded (gold plated) inside.

The set is in excellent condition and is without any dents, splits or repairs.

Byachrananda, J., Thai Mother-of-Pearl Inlay, River Books, 2001.

UK art market