• The Character of Home
• Explore the Townhouse
  • The Fairfax Family
  • Building the Georgian Townhouse
  • John Carr of York: Architect
  • Eighteenth-century York
  • Secrets of the Stucco
  • Cinema Days: St Georges Hall
  • Memories of St George’s Hall and Cinema
  • Silver Screen 2017
  • The Restoration
• Explore the Collection
  • Noel Terry & his Collection
  • Furniture
  • Clocks
  • Silver
  • Artworks
  • Rare historic pieces reunited
  • What is a Candlestand or Torchère?
  • Candlepower

Silver

Our celebrated silver collection lavishly adorns the dining room, matching its elegant and formal style, and recreating the elaborate and abundant table setting guests would have experienced when attending a dinner at this townhouse.

The Fairfaxes, like most families of their rank, would have possessed a handsome array of expensive silver and silver plate. Reflecting their collecting habits, and assisted by the generous bequest of Leslie Bootham and Arthur Smallwood (lifelong antiques collectors and friends of Noel Terry) Fairfax House has created a collection of dining silver representing prominent silversmiths of the eighteenth century. Together these pieces perfectly reveal the fashionable styles and modes of ‘polite’ dining, and offer a glimpse of the fabulous light-reflecting qualities that such silver would have presented when seen by candlelight.

On display in the Dining Room are many exquisite pieces including an epergne by William Cripps, a set of four George III candlesticks by Daniel Smith and Robert Sharp, sauce ladles by Paul de Lamerie and an exceptional set of six silver salts by R. Garrard, ornately decorated with nubian figures. Mirroring Lord Fairfax’s tastes, the collection also includes a pair of sauceboats by Frederick Kandler, a catholic London silversmith patronised by Lord Fairfax.

Complementing these luxurious dining accoutrements, Fairfax House also boasts the exceptionally rare silver-gilt Gibraltar Cup (1704) which was presented by Queen Ann to Admiral Robert Fairfax in gratitude for his help in the capture of Gibraltar.