Lot details
A late Victorian Arts & Crafts two-handled covered bowl, by Charles Robert Ashbee for Guild of Handicrafts Ltd., London 1900, the cover with acorn finial set with a green stone cabochon, the bowl with two wirework handles and flared foot, 9 1/2in. (24cms) wide, 12.5oz. gross. NB A similar design with variation of finial is in the Victorian & Albert Museum Collections, Ref. No. M.44 & A-1972. Charles Robert Ashbee (1863-1942), was a pivotal figure in the Arts and Crafts Movement. He studied history at Cambridge before he turned to architecture. He was taught by the architect G.F. Bodley in Whitechapel, London. During this period he also attended Toynbee Hall, a university settlement in the East End of London, where he attended a lecture by William Morris on the Aims of Art. Whilst at Toynbee he conceived the idea of the Guild of Handicraft. On the 23rd June, 1888, the Guild of Handicraft was formed. Their first premises were in Essex House, Mile End Road, where they produced woodwork, metalwork, paintings. leatherwork, enamelling and jewellery. They had a retail outlet in Brook Street, Mayfair. In 1902 the ever expanding enterprise moved to Chipping Camden in the Cotswolds. It continued production until fierce competition from the London Polytechnics Institutes and firms such as Liberty, forced it into closure in 1907. See illustration