Tiny Tuesday shares its love!
This sweet, little trinket box shaped like a heart date to the early 1890s. The white Limoges china is delicately hand painted with gold flowers and leaves; to add contrast, the petals are in “jewel” shades of blue, pink, and white.
The bottom is stamped “A K France,” for A. Klingenberg, an accomplished Limoges artisan that opened his porcelain factory and studio in the early 1880s. Klingenberg would later join the studio of fellow Limoges artist Charles Dwenger in the late 1890s; the two would create porcelain pieces until 1910. Klingenberg may have created the blank china, but another artist, with the initials “G.H.S.”, painted the lovely flowers.
So, who was GHS?
Those initials belong to Garrie Howard Sherman (1871-1940), a Fall River native who graduated from BMC Durfee High School in 1889. Like many young ladies during this period, Garrie dabbled in porcelain painting, and likely gave this box as a gift to her friend and classmate, Mary Kilburn Fisher (1871-1954). The box was donated to the FRHS in 1979 by Mary’s daughter, Ella Fisher (Buffington) Aldrich.
This small yet sentimental box was surely a treasured gift and, with Valentine’s Day just around the corner, perfect for this week’s installment of Tiny Tuesday!