Objects

A silver-plated table spoon with lettering engraved on the handle. The bowl of the spoon is shallow, it has an oblong shape tapering towards the ends. The handle is flat, widening towards the finial, rounded. Along the neck, the lettering “Ziemiańska” is engraved. The back of the handle is engraved with the manufacturer’s mark “Fraget (MB) Plaque” (Fabryka Wyrobów Srebrnych i Plateralnych Józef Fraget – Józef Fraget Factory of Silver and Plated Products).

The name engraved on the handle suggests that the spoon was part of the equipment of the Mała Ziemiańska café. The popularity of the premises led the owners to renovate and enlarge them in 1927. It was when the place was decorated with, inter alia, polychromes referring to the seasons by Wacław Borowski. The famous mezzanine was also arranged at that time, with a table reserved for the members of the Skamander literary group. The so-called “Big Five” were: Julian Tuwim, Jarosław Iwaszkiewicz, Kazimierz Wierzyński, Antoni Słonimski, and Jan Lechoń.

A silver-plated spoon with an engraving certainly accompanied the tasting of many a meal served during the meetings of the pre-war Warsaw’s crème de la crème. It may have been used by the guests meeting at the famed mezzanine table. Was it held by one of the Scamandrites? Or perhaps by a famous painter or musician sitting at a table on the ground floor?

The spoon is presented in Gallery no. 6 “On a Jewish street (19187–1939)”, in the space referring to the interior of the Mała Ziemiańska café.

Marta Frączkiewicz