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Lost & found at the V&A…

26/4/2014

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…a series inspired by my experiences as a volunteer Welcoming Ambassador at the Victoria & Albert Museum

Three toast racks in four centuries

“To make dry toast properly, a great deal of attention is required, much more, indeed, than people generally suppose.”

Mrs Beeton, Household Management, 1861

The toast rack appears to be a purely British invention from the late 18th century. They were sometimes referred to as ‘toast machines’, and Mrs Beeton (the 19th-century household management guru) wrote about the importance of toast racks in her well-known book Household Management in 1861, advising that “As soon as each piece is ready, it should be put into a rack, or stood upon its edges, and sent quickly to table.”

As useful objects, toast racks have somewhat fallen out of favour recently. As examples of design, however, they are timeless. I’ve taken three examples, each of which serves as a reflection of the significant design innovations/movements of their time...and a fourth that demonstrates the timelessness of good design.

1) The 18th Century - Hester Bateman toast rack

The first piece in our ‘Toast Rack Tour’ is in the Silver Galleries, room 65. It was produced in the workshop of Hester Bateman, a successful silversmith in the late 18th century. She learned her trade from her husband, and she set up her own business when he died in 1760. The V&A says that it’s likely that she managed the workshop rather than made the silver pieces herself. Her firm was one of the most technologically advanced silver firms in London at the time, exporting across England and North America.

Picture
Hester Bateman Toast Rack 1787-88. M.125-1940, Room 65, case 19, shelf 15. Photo: M. Doyle.
This silver toast rack, from Bateman's workshop in 1787-88, is elegant and modern, with its oval shape and clean lines. The rack of wirework and the base were cut from sheet. The components were machine made but assembled by hand as a result of new production techniques developed in Sheffield.

Technological developments from the 1760s led to manufacturing innovations that are demonstrated in a number of toast racks from the period. Sheffield plate, for example, was a laminate of sterling silver fused onto a copper core. It was cheaper to use than silver and meant items could be produced for less wealthy customers using designs originally made in more expensive silver. Some toast racks of this period were made almost entirely of sections of wire soldered together.

2) The 19th Century – Christopher Dresser toast rack

The second piece in our tour of toast racks is in the British Galleries, room 125, on level 4.

Freelance designer Christopher Dresser is, in my book, the King of Toast Racks. His toast racks are among his most innovative and recognisable designs – simple lines, striking profiles, form and function brought together in an apparently effortless way.
Dresser - botanist, writer, scholar, designer - was working in the late 19th century, and his ethos contrasted with that of his contemporary William Morris. Morris and his Arts and Crafts movement deplored the way industry and mass production were breaking the link between maker and user. They wanted a return to the integrity and honesty of hand crafting. Dresser, on the other hand, celebrated the opportunities offered by mass production and the way it could bring beautiful design to a wide audience.

This Dresser toast rack, made in 1880, is of electroplated nickel silver. It was mass produced and anticipates the Modernist style of the following century.

Picture
Christopher Dresser Toast Rack 1880. M.14-2005. Room 125e, case 1. Photo: © V&A Images.
3) The 20th Century – Robert Welch toast rack

The third item in the tour is in the 20th Century Gallery on level 3.

Mid-century designer Robert Welch carried on the tradition of Arts and Crafts designers but like Dresser he embraced mass production. His Campden Range from 1957 demonstrated an early use of stainless steel for dining tableware. The rocket-like shapes of his candelabra and cruet set reflect the interest in the emerging Space Age.
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Robert Welch Campden Toast Rack 1958. Photo: Old Hall Club http://www.oldhallclub.co.uk
Welch was appointed as design consultant to J.J. Wiggin of Bloxwich, a family business established in 1893 that began manufacturing stainless steel tableware in 1928. The story goes that the current owner's grandmother suggested stainless steel as low-maintenance alternative to silver. The company was also known as Old Hall and it produced many notable designs in stainless steel in the mid-20th century.

This toast rack was made in 1958 and is of stainless steel. It won Welch the Council of Industrial Design Award in 1958. The judges praised its ‘economical design’, its ‘elegant and ingenious construction’ and the ‘eminently suitable material’ of stainless steel.

2) (again) The 21st Century – Alessi toast rack

And finally, we come to the last toast rack in our tour, which unfortunately is not on display in the V&A. It’s not a fourth example but a revisit of the second one - a stainless steel modern replica of the Dresser toast rack shown above, still being produced by the Italian company Alessi.



Perhaps toast racks haven't fallen completely out of fashion then. Thank goodness for that. Mrs Beeton would be pleased that standards of toast making are being maintained to this day.
Picture
Alessi Toast Rack 2005. M.14-2005. Photo: © V&A Images.
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Lost & found at the V&A....

17/3/2014

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…a series inspired by my experiences as a volunteer Welcoming Ambassador at the Victoria & Albert Museum

Madam, breakfast is served

The restaurant at the V&A was originally a place for evening meals – for Victorian folk to get a reasonably priced bite to eat after work before wandering the collection to be educated in, and inspired by, what was good taste and what was bad. 

For me, breakfast, not dinner, is the most inspiring meal of the day. These days, you can get a very decent breakfast in the Museum’s restaurant. And afterwards, you can wander the collection and marvel at objects inspired by the most inspirational meal of the day.
Picture
Breakfast table. W.64:1 to 3-1950. © V&A Images.
Start in the British Galleries, 4th floor, in a side gallery (room 118a), with a table from the mid-eighteenth century. Not just any table, but a mahogany breakfast table designed by Thomas Chippendale, furniture designer extraordinaire, and made by an unknown maker somewhere around 1760.

Apparently, Henry VIII had a walnut breakfast table in his Privy Chamber. In the 1700s, the rich and fashionable continued to have breakfast in their bedrooms, and tables were adapted to include storage for writing and reading, for those with multi-tasking skills. 
Eggs are, of course, a staple of the Anglo-Saxon breakfast (although in the past both broth and sardines were popular, and our Continental neighbours in Germany and the Netherlands prefer hams and cheeses). The rich would have had cups for boiled eggs made of silver, but the designs were for everyone and were made in less expensive materials for the less wealthy. 

This egg cup stand, also in room 118a, is from about 1790 and was made in moulded creamware, in a design probably originally made in Sheffield plate.    
Picture
Egg cup stand. C.5 to F-1945. © V&A Images.
The Museum’s description notes that although the egg stand is elegant, a “minor drawback was the fact that the eggcup feet (which provided stability) had to be smaller than the bowls in order to lodge in the holes of the stand.” A bit of a fashion victim, then, but also a survivor. The creamware examples were vulnerable to breakage, so it is rare to have one intact as this one is.

You would need a toast rack to serve the toast. While in this part of the British Galleries, have a look at the toast rack in the Woolfson Gallery, room 118 – a stunning example of toast rack design in an unusual shape of a lyre. 

This one is from 1790, not long after the toast rack first appeared on English breakfast tables, and is made of Sheffield plate (copper-plated silver).
Picture
Toast rack. M.122-1937. © V&A Images.
Picture
Dressing gown. T.395-1980. © V&A Images.

Now consider what to wear to breakfast, and head to room 125b, case 3. 

This dressing gown from the mid-nineteenth century would have been the perfect outfit – casual but beautiful and very warm (for those draughty houses). It’s made of jacquard woven silk, quilted and silk-lined, in a style of a frock coat.

Often, men wore these over their nightshirts if they had just jumped out of bed, but some put on their trousers and shirt first, then the dressing gown.

Breakfast attire can be even more outrageous, as in this dress of Dame Edna Everidge’s that pays homage to the Full English. You can see it in the Theatre and Performing Arts Gallery, a mini-museum within the V&A. 

Complete with sausages, bacon, eggs and baked beans, the dress celebrates breakfast with the irreverent fervor this most humorous of meals deserves. Dame Edna (Barry Humphries’ ‘housewife superstar’ creation) said she felt like ‘a transport caff on legs’ wearing this.

Picture
Breakfast dress for Dame Edna Everidge, designed by Stephen Adnitt, 1996 © Margaret Doyle 2014.
Who knew that breakfast at the V&A could serve up such a sumptuous smorgasbord of delights?
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    About me

    I'm Margaret Doyle, a mediator and researcher in administrative justice. I'm also a Welcoming Ambassador at the Victoria & Albert Museum, the world's leading museum of art and design.

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