Department of State Collection

I know it seems like all we ever talk about is Presidential china, but we do some pretty cool things for other high levels of our government, too. This is just one plate that we do for the Department of State. We actually have done a wide variety of items for the State Department over the years. Perhaps, we'll showcase more of them here from time to time.

After all....Thomas Jefferson was our very first Secretary of State.....right?

Smithsonian Catalog

Speaking of catalogs, did you see the Smithsonian Catalog that has been out for the past month or so? The folks at The Smithsonian have been working hard and it shows. I don't remember a Smithsonian catalog being so well organized and beautiful, loaded with such great treasures! We really loved the section on art glass and the Gel Bracelets on the back cover are really terrific.

Then....there seems to be a few pieces of china from a certain President Lincoln fellow. VERY nice. And, the book shown just to the right of our Lincoln china is the Barry Landau book "The President's Table" which we have talked about in this column before. It's a great (and fun) read and if you haven't seen this book....why not go to http://www.smithsoniancatalog.com/ and order one now.

Might be a good time to pick up a Lincoln dessert plate - or twelve, as well!

New Woodmere Catalog on It's Way

Here's a 'work-in-progress' version of the new catalog we are working on. This will be our first catalog that will have all our collections in one place. We have wanted to do one of these for some time now, but, it is simply a huge undertaking. However, work is underway and - ideally - you will see this before too long or at least sometime during the summer.

We also are working on a few new products which you will hear about soon. Lots to do to keep us busy these days.

White House Table Service from old book

Here's a photo from an item offered on eBay. It's a page from an old book called "Brown Book of Boston" and this single page (with music printed on the reverse) is being sold online. Truly amazing.

I love that there is this type of interest in a subject so near and dear to us. It's really hard to think of any other type of historical memorabilia that has such a high level of interest. And, let's face it....if you took the presidential component away, many of these patterns would not gain any interest at all. They'd just be old dishes.