If you happen to visit San Francisco International Airport this spring, you can drop by in the SFO Museum. This museum presents an exhibition of British silver design 1957 – 2018.
During the postwar years, anyone looking to produce modern design looked to Scandinavia for inspiration, and British silversmiths were no exception. In the late 1950s, an American named Mrs. Lasky travelled to London to visit a friend. Wanting to see modern British silver, she visited the studio of Gerald Benney (1930–2008). Upon viewing his stock items, Mrs. Lasky proclaimed they were not British, but Scandinavian. Shaken by the charge that he was following the Bauhaus School, Benney set out with four or five others to create a distinctively English silver that was “rugged, solid, and functional, but at the same time modern.”
Today, Britain continues to provide the expertise and creative environment that nurtures home-grown talent and attracts student silversmiths from around the world who bring a diversity of influences to British silver design. The Worshipful Company of Goldsmiths, more commonly known as the Goldsmiths’ Company, plays a significant role in this ongoing development through patronage, educational programs, and training offered at its Goldsmiths’ Centre in London. So too does Edinburgh’s Incorporation of Goldsmiths, which promotes education within the trade and encourages patronage through its annual festival and purchasing exhibition.
06.10.2018 – 12.05.2019 San Francisco International Airport, International Terminal, Departures – Level 3 – Pre-Security