Aztec Teaspoon

A set of teaspoons that carries Héctor Aguilar's design vocabulary from the jewelry case to the table, this Aztec pattern service shows how completely the Taller Borda's aesthetic could translate into flatware. Each spoon pairs a warm-toned wooden handle with a silver terminal worked into paired volutes, the scrolling form that recurs throughout Aguilar's production, so that even the smallest utensil reads unmistakably as his. Flatware in this combination of silver and carved wood represents a distinct and considered strand of the workshop's output, and a full matched set surviving together speaks to the coherence of the original service.

The design logic is characteristic. The polished oval bowl tapers to a slim silver ferrule, the wooden shaft is shaped with a gentle facet, and the handle resolves in the volute finial with its small suspended bead. Penny Morrill, in Silver Masters of Mexico, singles out precisely this interplay in Aguilar's wood-and-silver serving pieces, where curved volute lines flow outward toward the bowls and the repeated motif in carved wood and bright silver produces a balanced, elegant composition. The same discipline governs these teaspoons: the ornament is confined to the terminal, letting material contrast and clean line do the work.

The set belongs to Aguilar's independent period, 1939 to 1962, when the Taller Borda in Taxco supplied both wearable silver and objects for the table. Morrill documents the practical side of this production as well, noting that much of the machine-assisted table silver sold in Taxco in these years was fabricated in Mexico City to the designers' specifications, with Aguilar himself among those directing such work. Whatever the division of labor behind them, these spoons remain fully his in conception: modest in scale, exacting in finish, and unmistakably of the Taxco school at mid-century.