Silver? Harder to Pick than It Would Seem...
So, DRB (my soon-to-be) did some investigative shopping last weekend to educate ourselves on the process of selecting fine china, silver, and stemware. OK, can we say overwhelming?! I visited the Enchanted Owl in Greenville, a must-do for Delaware brides. Expecting to find a stuffy atmosphere with old ladies that could be Emily Post or Letitia Baldridge reincarnated, I was pleasantly surprised to see that not only did the store have beautiful things that I actually like (!), the staff was DELIGHTFUL.
We worked with Mary who was a hoot (no pun intended) and had great advice - while she was older, she was young at heart and quite spritely! She knew her etiquette and every item in the store, but steered us away from "unnecessary" items like charger plates! I figured charger plates would be a must-have, although she astutely pointed out, why bother - they get removed after the first course anyway and then there is just more to wash! We quickly picked a very beautiful, traditional fine china, but with a non-conservative flair to it. It's Marielle Indigo by Thomas O'Brien for Reed & Barton. It is surprisingly more affordable than expected.
The stemware was another easy pick - Nachtman (a division of Reidel) Samba. Again, surprisingly affordable for the quality.
And, then came the sterling silver selection. Now, that is a whole different ball game. There were no prices on the pattern I selected - she would have to call for them. But, Mary reinforced that the pattern I selected was really expensive. I was slightly put off by that - after all, while I look young, I'm not and my friends are at the point in their lives that they have some disposable income. I don't want to choose cheap silver.
So, when we returned home, I jumped on my trusty Macbook and found the silver I had selected. It's called Triumph by Tuttle. Um, yeah. So, a full set is $12,224!!! It's $700 a place setting with no extras! Holy Moly! I almost passed out. I truly had no idea that silver was this expensive. I totally thought a set was going to be between $2500 - $5000 depending on what we selected. Yeah, so that is not the case. Clearly.
So back to the drawing board on silver. Here are some other patterns I have selected that I also like - not as much but I can live with them.
Williamsburg Shell
Old Newbury
Woodwind
Hester Bateman (which sooo makes me giggle and think of Hester Prynne from the Scarlet Letter)
So what do you think? Which do you like best? Help me pick!!! And, if you have any pointers or advice in picking silver - I'm all ears!!! Speak up!
We worked with Mary who was a hoot (no pun intended) and had great advice - while she was older, she was young at heart and quite spritely! She knew her etiquette and every item in the store, but steered us away from "unnecessary" items like charger plates! I figured charger plates would be a must-have, although she astutely pointed out, why bother - they get removed after the first course anyway and then there is just more to wash! We quickly picked a very beautiful, traditional fine china, but with a non-conservative flair to it. It's Marielle Indigo by Thomas O'Brien for Reed & Barton. It is surprisingly more affordable than expected.
The stemware was another easy pick - Nachtman (a division of Reidel) Samba. Again, surprisingly affordable for the quality.
And, then came the sterling silver selection. Now, that is a whole different ball game. There were no prices on the pattern I selected - she would have to call for them. But, Mary reinforced that the pattern I selected was really expensive. I was slightly put off by that - after all, while I look young, I'm not and my friends are at the point in their lives that they have some disposable income. I don't want to choose cheap silver.So, when we returned home, I jumped on my trusty Macbook and found the silver I had selected. It's called Triumph by Tuttle. Um, yeah. So, a full set is $12,224!!! It's $700 a place setting with no extras! Holy Moly! I almost passed out. I truly had no idea that silver was this expensive. I totally thought a set was going to be between $2500 - $5000 depending on what we selected. Yeah, so that is not the case. Clearly.
So back to the drawing board on silver. Here are some other patterns I have selected that I also like - not as much but I can live with them.
Williamsburg Shell
Old Newbury
Woodwind
Hester Bateman (which sooo makes me giggle and think of Hester Prynne from the Scarlet Letter)So what do you think? Which do you like best? Help me pick!!! And, if you have any pointers or advice in picking silver - I'm all ears!!! Speak up!
posted by Jenni at 10:03 AM
2 Comments:
Do you know that Andrew and I picked out our patterns online (GASP)? Mother in law was, needless to say, horrified. Everything worked out fine though - very happy w/our choices. ;)
Remember that you don't *have* to put silver on your resgistery, and I wouldn't unless you find something you really love. I mean, you're going to have it forever, right? Plus, you're likely going to get a decent amount in cash gifts -- you could use it to start a "silver" fund (and have the added bonus of being able to tell the guests that give cash that you used it to buy silver). And you also mentioned that you have some disposable income, so it's not like it's now or never on the silver.
The only reason I can think of for adding it now is that you think your entire registery will get purchased and not having it on there will mean guests are left w/out options. But even then, it doesn't seem like a great reason for registering for something you're not 100% excited about.
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