Art Deco and Egyptian Revival style silver gilt and enamel desk set

This delightful desk set was made during the Art Deco period in the popular Egyptian Revival style, utilising the mystique and grandeur of the art of that civilisation to imbue this practical study set with an extra level of attraction and aesthetic beauty.

Comprising an inkstand of rectagular form with two glass inkwells in round enamelled covers, it is centred on the large eagle-shaped rest with outstretched wings, that holds the inkwells in its talons. The set includes a desk seal with a sphinx terminal and engraved matrix, a blotter that is capped with a similar sphinx capital, a letter knife with an ivorine (ivory-replacement) blade, a pencil, and a nib cutter, each elegantly wound with a serpent, with all pieces decorated with matching enamel work in bright tones of red, green, and blues. 

The Egyptian revival was a movement that swept all fields of the arts from c.1880 to 1930, inspired by great archaeological finds by the French and British such as those of the tombs in the Valley of the Kings. With each new discovery a new wave of fascination with Egypt was unleashed on Continental Europe, with suitably majestic and grand artistic and architectural results, which this fine desk set, a beautiful addition to one's study, attests to. The stand and blotter are engraved with the initial WS in hieroglyphs, and the set comes in a fitted case.