1991.101.20, Oyster-shaped dish, Wood and Hughes, 1880-1890

Wood and Hughes was one of the largest and most influential silver manufacturers in the United States from the 1850s to the 1880s. Although seriously threatened by the loss of southern accounts during the Civil War, the firm survived and continued to produce silverware, especially flatware, through the end of the 19th century. 

Like many American firms, Wood and Hughes was inspired by Japanese naturalism and produced silverware into the 1890s that relied totally on natural forms for its decoration, and sometimes shape, as seen with this shell-shaped dish. 

Charles L. Venable, Silver in America, 1840-1940: A Century of Splendor (Dallas, Texas: Dallas Museum of Art; New York, New York; Harry N. Abrams, Inc., 1994), 191, 332 and 346.

Metropolitan Museum of Art~Read more about Nineteenth-Century American Silver.

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