Kalo Shop Handwrought Sterling Silver Serving Tray - 12.45 ozt. Marked on the underside. 

Size: 9 1/2 x 9 1/2 in. 

Weight: 12.45 ozt. 

The Kalo Shop was the leading maker of Arts and Crafts movement silver in Chicago, founded at the Kalo Arts and Crafts Community House school and workshop in Park Ridge, Illinois in 1900. A group of six women who had trained at the Art Institute of Chicago, led by Clara Pauline Barck Welles (1868-1965), decided to form the company after finding sexist pushback against their desire to work in the field, at first focusing on wood and leatherwork and eventually expanding into silversmithing and jewelry in the early 20th Century. In 1959 Barck Wells, who had hired almost exclusively women designers except for immigrant Scandinavian craftsmen, transferred control of the shop to four of them, but continued to manage the direction of the company until her passing. The shop closed in 1970 due to the difficulty of finding young people willing to apprentice as silversmiths, with Robert Bower, their last serving silversmith, passing away in the late 1990s. Today, Kalo pieces often bring high prices at auction and are found in the collections of major museums, both for their craftsmanship and for their place in the history of women’s rights and work movement.

All items are sold AS IS. Lot and condition details are for descriptive purposes only. Sarasota Estate Auction is not responsible for errors and/or omissions of condition. The absence of a condition report does not imply that the lot is perfect or free from wear, flaws, or characteristics of age. Please bid according to your own expertise, or request any additional information and/or photographs you deem necessary.