Look who came home with me today….







A gorgeous carved wooden bulldog inkwell with leather and felt collar. He can hold your ink pen in his mouth, loyal dog that he is. His head lifts up to reveal the inkwell, though the glass liner is missing, and at present the hinge is broken.
These boys are very hard to come by, getting very rare now! I have two at Maison Dog, so if you want to buy him click on the link to take you directly to the store.
Woof

Check out our Pugtastic Antiques and Collectibles for the Pug Lover. Perfect for a special Christmas
gift, although you know what they say… a dog is not just for Christmas…..

Maison Dog with be at Earls Court this weekend for Discover Dogs.
8-9 November.
Stand 283

http://www.discoverdogs.org.uk

Check out our gorgeous flyers…

antique dog

retro dog

Edie, my dog, as a Staffie, is unable to get a good moustache going on. Not like a Schnauzer, or even a Westie. She wanted to do her bit for Movember so I made her a (tasteful) collar.
Maybe it should be tackier.

Anyone want to donate to Edie on Movember's behalf?

Donate at

http://uk.movember.com/mospace/8683989

night light

Rare Antique Child's Night Light

I've just bought this gorgeous Child's Antique Candle Night Light. It's a rare survivor. Made in Germany around 1900 from a Bisque Porcelain. It has three sides; a Pug, a Cat, an Owl. They have holes for eyes so that the candle light can shine through. Full of charm and rare.

Die Cut Fan

Just found this Victorian Die Cut in the shape of a fan, decorated with dogs. It is a Trade Card for 'Stackhouses' Finest Shoes. Very Pretty

Antique Bulldog Inkwell

New in at Maison Dog is this wonderful rare 19C Antique Carved Wooden Inkwell depicting a Bulldog. He has his original glass eyes and a leather collar. He has a hole through his mouth where the pen/quill would have rested. He sits in a wooden three ball legged base. The top of his head lifts off to reveal the inkwell. Adore him!

Black Forest Fox Cleaning His Horn

Look who I have found today! Mr Fox. A rare Black Forest Carving of a fox with horns for boots. He has removed one boot and is giving it a jolly good clean. Gorgeous!!

Steiff Dachshund on Wheels

Look who just came home with me! A Charming Dachshund on Wheels

A Russet felt Dachshund with Glass eyes and a stitched nose, with some airbrushed detail, FF button in ear and mounted on chunky wooden wheels. The wheels are "eccentric" meaning the axis is not central, so that when pulled along, the dog appears to bob up and down. When he left the factory in Geingen he would have been wearing a leather collar.
He is 25cm long and was produced circa 1912
A similar one sold at Christies in Oct 2010 for around $800

New in today are two Victorian Glass Domes containing Antique Dogs...

Glass Dome 'Dogs Waiting for Dinner'

Dogs Waiting for Dinner - detail

 Two Dogs Waiting For Dinner is a rather large Victorian Dome containing miniature oak furniture: a Monks Chair and a table whose top flips up to make another seat, both perfectly  detailed; a miniature Wooden Clock, and two dogs waiting for their dinner, a Bronze Mastiff and a Black Forest carved St.
Bernard. Beautiful and very unusual.

Glass Dome 'Two Pious Pugs'

'Two Pious Pugs' - detail

Two Pious Pugs: A Victorian Pewter Ponce Pot Pug wearing a sober top hat and a small metal fellow sitting on a miniature Bible.
This is a miniature antique Dome, and is utterly charming.

Drummer Dog Black Forest Whip Hook

New to my Collection is this lovely Drummer Dog Whiphook. Whiphooks and Dogs! My two favourite things. So thrilled to have this boy.

antique spiked metal dog collar

I have a passion for collecting Antique Dog Collars. Such objects of beauty. The leather ones are my favourites but these do not always age well; the leather can get very stiff and start cracking. Metal collars are more collectible, especially those with intricate engravings, or those collars that show that the dog was owned by someone famous.

antique leather and brass dog collar

antique leather and brass spiked dog collar

antique leather and brass dog collar with spikes and tax disc

I love the old brass tax discs/tags that used to have to be added to the collar

antique white metal and leather dog collar

Brass Plated Chain dog collar

small rolled leather dog collar with bells

Victorian Die Cuts

At Maison Dog we are stocking Original Victorian Die Cuts, specifically dogs of course!
Very desirable, yet very affordable.
A bit about the origin of these Victorian Scrapbooking images...

From the early 1800s publishers produced 
picture sheets that were uncoloured or, at extra cost, hand coloured and sold by stationers and booksellers.
The colourful reliefs, adored by the Victorians, were embossed and glossy. They are said to have been imported to Britain in the 1850s and soon became popular as decorative additions to Christmas cards and valentines. They were also used to illustrate historical as well as popular events of the time.
The immediate forerunner of the embossed scraps were sheets containing small chromos printed in a rectangular format to be cut out in exactly the same way as the first penny postage stamps.
In the Victorian home a fashionable pastime was to embellish the folding screens that the draughty living rooms required.
Production
Scraps, known as reliefs, chromos or die-cuts, were printed by chromolithography, stamped out and embossed.
After printing of the scrap the sheets were coated with a gelatine and gum layer which gave the finished sheets a glossy surface, embossing came next giving the scrap their three-dimensional look.
The final production process was to pass them through a punching / stamping press to cut away the unrequired areas of paper from the design leaving the individual images connected by small ladders, often bearing the name or initials of the maker.
The elaborate use of stamping can often be seen in uncut scrap sheets. Optimum use of space, required minimal cutting and lead to the intricate and ingenious design of the cutting die.

japanese wind-up jumping dog

Tinplate was used in the manufacture of toys beginning in the mid-19th century. The toys were made from thin sheets of steel plated with tin, hence the name tinplate. They were a cheap and durable substitute for wooden toys. The toys were originally assembled and painted by hand. Spring activated tin toys originated in Germany in the 1850s. In the late 1880s offset lithography was used to print designs on tinplate. After the colorful designs were printed on the metal, they were formed by dies and assembled with small tabs. The lightweight of the toys allowed them to be shipped less expensively and easier than the heavier cast iron toys.
Germany was the major producer of tin toys in the world in the early 20th century. The most famous German manufacturer of tin toys was Ernst Paul Lehmann who is said to have exported 90% of his toys. France and England joined the fray and it wasn't long before hundreds of thousands of these tin toys were being manufactured.


Production of tin toys in the United States started earlier, but began in earnest when tin ore mines were opened in Illinois providing easily available and cheap raw materials. A number of manufactures scrambled to catch up in the beginning of the 20th century, but it wasn't until after World War I, with anti-German sentiment high, that they began to make real gains. There was a growing demand for American produced products and by the 1920s American firms had overtaken the competition. The largest and most successful firm from the 1920s to the 1960s was Louis Marx and Company. Marx produced a huge number of designs and depended on large sales volumes to keep prices down.


The production of tin toys was discontinued during World War II because of the need for raw materials in the war effort. After the war, tin toys were produced in large numbers in Japan. Under occupation and the Marshall Plan, manufacturers in Japan were granted the right to resume production. The idea was to give Japan all of the low profit; high labor manufacturing and the US companies could sell the imported product. It worked better than they had expected and Japan became a tin toy manufacturing force until the end of the 1950s. In the 1960s cheaper plastic and new government safety regulations ended the reign of tin toys. Presently, China has taken over the role of the leading tin toy manufacturing country. (source Wikipedia)

This is a Chiltern Bonzo, based upon the early Studdy Dog, similar in facial looks to my dog.


looks like my Bonzo here, with the red bow..
see link - http://www.worldcollectorsnet.com/magazine/issue28/iss28p4/


This Bonzo sold for close to £1000 in 2007 at Christies. It is very rare to find a Bonzo Dog with a swing tag.
http://www.christies.com/lotfinder/lot/a-rare-chad-valley-bonzo-dog-4944595-details.aspx?intObjectID=4944595


My Bonzo Perfume Bottles

black forest musical whip hook

I finally added to my collection of Whip Hooks this Black Forest Musical Terrier Whiphook.
A late Victorian Piece. Very Beautiful. A dog! At last!
See my post below about Black Forest Whip Hooks
If you are interested in buying any of my Collection of Dog Antiques please contact me at
maisondoglondon@gmail.com
Website www.maisondog.co.uk coming soon
Also check out more of my collection on Pintrest -

http://pinterest.com/maisondog/coming-soon-at-maison-dog/

http://www.maisondog.co.uk/#!paintings/ckkm

Bonzo - Studdy Dogs Portfolio

Today I bought 51 Original Litho Prints Taken Directly from 'The Studdy Dogs' Books.

The Sketch published the first Studdy Dogs Portfolio in 1922 using images taken from the weekly issues of Bonzo in the Sketch Magazine. Over the next 3 years The Second Studdy Dogs Portfolio, The Bonzo Book (being the Third Studdy Dogs portfolio), Bonzo's Star Turns (being the Fourth Studdy Dogs Portfolio) the Fifth and Sixth Studdy Dogs Portfolios were all issued. Each set contained 15 prints except for the fifth and sixth which had just 8 and each portfolio had a specially drawn cover image. Recently a seventh portfolio has been found which also contains 8 prints. After Portfolio 4 there were apparently no announcements in The Sketch that a new set of prints was being issued so that until recently it was believed that there were just 6 portfolio's; could there be an eighth somewhere??

George Studdy was a prolific illustrator and contributed to dozens of magazines over the years. By far his biggest recognised contribution was to The Sketch magazine which was, ultimately, the source of Bonzo's name. The earliest recorded entry in The Sketch was 1906 with fairly regular contributions lasting for over 30 years.

Steiff Bully

Here is Steiff  'Bully', the lovely brindle bulldog!


Steiff is a German-based plush toy company known for its high quality. It was begun in 1880 by Margarete Steiff, who was later assisted by her brother Fritz.
The toys began as elephants, and were originally a design Steiff found in a magazine and sold as pincushions to her friends. However, children began playing with them, and in the years following she went on to design many other successful animal-themed toys for children, such as dogs, cats and pigs. She designed and made most of the prototypes herself.
The Steiff's nephew Richard joined in 1897 and gave the company an enormous boost in popularity by creating the teddy bear in 1902. In 1907, Steiff manufactured 974,000 bears, and has been increasing its output ever since.
The Steiff company motto, as styled by Margarete Steiff, is "Only the best is good enough for children". Steiff products are subject to meticulous testing and inspection. They are required to be highly flame resistant and, among other things, smaller pieces such as eyes must be able to resist considerable tension, wear and tear, etc.
The most common materials used in Steiff toys are alpaca, felt, mohair, and woven plush. Eyes are generally made of wood or glass, and the stuffing is commonly wood shavings or polyester fibers. A large amount of the work is done by hand, from design sketches to airbrushed paint. The final touch on any Steiff toy is the trademark "button in ear" (assuming the animal has one; in any case they'll find a spot for it).
The famed "button in ear" was devised by Margarete's nephew Franz in 1904, to keep counterfeits from being passed off as authentic Steiff toys. It is metal and originally had the symbol of an elephant, later replaced by the name "Steiff". The button is still used to distinguish Steiff toys from fakes.Some special toys have both the elephant and the name. (source wikipedia)

Black Forest Hare Whip Hooks

Here you can see two of my Hunting Hare Whiphooks together. See how similar they are, and yet so different.  The facial expression, the sleeve cuffs, the paws. These two are most probably made of walnut circa 1880.
The best carvers would have workshops with a team of the best craftsmen following set designs from catalogues, but they would all have slight style differences. This way you can tell you have bought an original, that and the way the wood has been handled on the surface, with a build up of dirt in the deeper grooves.