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A silver salad fork distinguished by projections at the neck and a chased design along the handle, this piece carries hand-worked ornament into a utilitarian implement. The chasing, engraved into the handle by hammer and tool, gives the fork a decorated surface that sets it apart from plain flatware.
The same fork was also made in a plain version without the chasing, so the design exists in both a decorated and an unadorned form. That pairing documents how Spratling offered a single flatware pattern at two levels of finish, the chased version carrying the additional handwork.
The fork dates to Spratling's First Design Period, 1931 to 1946, the formative years at Las Delicias when the workshop was establishing its table service. A chased salad fork with neck projections sits within that early flatware output, the kind of hand-decorated serving piece that extended the workshop's craft from jewelry to the table.
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