Antique silver hand mirror value
Complete canteens of antique silver cutlery are hard to come by, but some 19th-century sets do sometimes come up for sale. So, how much are antique silver spoons, for example, worth today? They’re actually a smart starting point for a budget collection - you can sell an pair of ‘berry’ spoons with a fiddle-and-thread pattern from 1832 for as much as £100. Prices (along with quality) dropped dramatically. This mass-production meant that a rise in silver lookalikes occured, made from Old Sheffield plate. Items such as antique silver spoons were made in huge quantities during the Victorian period - a time when the growing middle classes were showing off their new-found wealth. You’ll find day-to-day items such as antique silver cutlery in abundance when trawling antiques shops and centres. Prices, of course, depend on who buys antique silverware and the desirability of the object at hand. Scrap now only fetches about £2 per ounce, compared to £20 about 40 years back. Antique silver has long been valued according to the weight of the item (for example, £40 an ounce for antique silver teapots).
The great tragedy of silver is that it’s been considered recyclable for centuries, meaning brilliant pieces have been melted down to finance wars or simply forged into something more in vogue at the time.
Yet despite their opulence, many silver antiques can be bought for bargain prices. From teapots to trinkets, antique silver candlesticks to antique silver cutlery, these gleaming pieces combine strength and intricate design to create objects of real beauty. Antique silver is one of the most versatile and glamorous of all precious metals.