Rectangular Rosewood Ashtray

A silver ashtray set into a rectangular rosewood frame, this object joins a functional metal vessel to a warm wooden surround, the pairing of materials that runs through Spratling's table designs. It dates to the first design period, 1931 to 1946.

The rosewood frame against the silver dish is the warm-material-against-reflective-metal contrast Morrill places at the center of Spratling's work (Morrill, p. 224), the wood softening and framing the practical silver insert. Ashtrays were a standard product of the workshop's hollowware.

The form belongs to the ashtrays listed among the objects shown in the 1965 "World of William Spratling" traveling exhibition (Morrill, p. 77).