Hallmarks...required if item isn't "sold"?

[Chris Moody]

Hello all

I'm a hobbyist silversmith, only making items that fall within the exemption weights for sale.

However, for work, I am making a silver "trophy" which is going to be a little heavier than the exemption weight.

My question is, does the item still need hallmarking if it technically isn't being sold? It's a prize, so in theory the winner has paid for it through hard work, but no cash is exchanging hands.

[Dennis]

Hi Chris,
I would say that it is not obligatory to hallmark this trophy, but the hallmark would greatly enhance its perceived value. So much so, that without it the recipient might well wonder whether he has been given a cheapo plated job. Dennis.

[pearlescence]

You can always ask someone with a registration to put it through for you?
Ah, if only Steve were here...I seem to remember that items can be assayed and marked by the assay office itself, no sponsor mark

[BarryM]

You can always ask someone with a registration to put it through for you?
Ah, if only Steve were here...I seem to remember that items can be assayed and marked by the assay office itself, no sponsor mark

I am fairly sure that a registered sponsor cannot put someone else's work through as their own - nothing to prevent you physically doing this but I think it is actually illegal. There is a thread somewhere in this forum about it.

[Goldsmith]

I am fairly sure that a registered sponsor cannot put someone else's work through as their own - nothing to prevent you physically doing this but I think it is actually illegal. There is a thread somewhere in this forum about it.

I think you are wrong Barry, in all of my career as a goldsmith, with my own registered hallmark, almost 98% of my work over my career has had other's hallmarks on it. When you work within the trade and the likes of Asprey, Garrard, Cartier and Kutchinsky buy your work for resale, they expect to have their own company hallmark on the finished piece and not the mark of the craftsman who made the piece. The hallmark guarantees the quality of the metals but not the manufacturer. Not much of what the main names sell was actually made by their own craftsmen. When I watch the antiques programs on TV, I often think it would be nice if the actual makers ever got credit from the experts. This was one reason why I had a book of my work printed in 2009 so that some may know of my work in the future.

James
James Miller FIPG.

[BarryM]

James, You certainly know a lot more about this than I do and I am sure that the examples you mentioned are correct. I just seem to remember that places like Cooksons and others used to offer a hallmarking service where you could send your work to them and they would have it hallmarked under their sponsor mark and then return them to you (at a charge of course). This was stopped as (I thought) it broke the hallmarking regulations? Do you know the background to this?

[Goldsmith]

I don't know about the Cooksons offering that service, but I do know that if you just send items to the London Assay office they will assay and hallmark it with the LAO mark. I just know that loads of my pieces will go down in history as being made by Asprey as it has their hallmarks on it as they were commissioned or bought by them and sold in their shops around the world.

I made this piece back in 1981.


James

[BarryM]

I don't know about the Cooksons offering that service, but I do know that if you just send items to the London Assay office they will assay and hallmark it with the LAO mark. I just know that loads of my pieces will go down in history as being made by Asprey as it has their hallmarks on it as they were commissioned or bought by them and sold in their shops around the world.

I made this piece back in 1981.

James

James - I have found the thread where this was discussed - HERE

[Goldsmith]

Barry, I saw that thread but didn't want to get involved. I think it would be great if it was the law that states the maker's mark should be on every hallmarked piece as Steve seemed to suggest, but we all know this is not true. Go to any high street jeweller and you will see their hallmark on the pieces they sell, do you actually believe they make the pieces. Ask yourself why the London Assay Office have a branch for collecting work for assay at Heathrow airport, most of the jewellery sold on the high street is made abroad these days, imported from the manufacturers in India or Thailand, then hallmarked in London with the shop's hallmark. I have a friend who owns a few jewellery shops and he can buy finished diamond set rings from Thailand for a cost that is less than the cost of just buying the gold and diamonds would be in the UK, without any manufacturing cost, so who can compete with that, and also the rings he buys all get hallmarked with his own registered hallmark as he is the commissioner of the pieces.
As I said before the likes of Garrard, who have not had their own workshops since 1953, so anything that has a Garrard hallmark on it, dated after then was not actually made by Garrard. The only workshop staff employed by Garrard do stock cleaning and restorations. It's the same at Asprey in recent years.

I have never in my life been employed at Asprey, but a friend of mine sent me this old Asprey Fifth Avenue catalogue that has a photo of me on it's second page. I was making an egg that Asprey purchased from my employer and then resold as their own manufacture complete with an Asprey Hallmark on it.



James

[jayneharrison]

I'm a student at Sheffield College (pretty much next door to the assay office) and we can send work in through the college to be assayed and marked without needing our own sponsor mark.