Heavy Oval Silver Tray

A heavy oval silver tray with a wide rim is holloware at its most confident, relying on weight, proportion, and the breadth of its plain rim rather than on ornament. The generous border frames a smooth oval field, and the substance of the metal is itself the statement. The tray is recorded in Spratling Silver by Cederwall and Riney, in its Centennial Edition, and in Penny Morrill's William Spratling and the Mexican Silver Renaissance: Maestros de Plata.

It dates from the first design period, 1931 to 1946, the founding years of Spratling's Las Delicias taller in Taxco.

Serving silver of this scale was a core part of the workshop's output, and a tray documented across three major references is among the better-anchored holloware pieces of the early period.