Étui and châtelaine

Worn at the waist for easy access, a châtelaine (or equipage, as it was known in the eighteenth century) is an ornamental clasp to which useful items are attached. Its main component was often an étui, a portable container full of a variety of useful articles. This case contains a penknife, scissors, a double-ended implement with tweezers on one side and a nail file on the other, two ivory tablets for jotting down notes, and a pencil holder. The two egg-shaped containers that hang on either side of the étui would have held scent that could be sniffed throughout the day; the white container includes a small sponge for this purpose, while the pink container is empty and likely not original to this object.


Étuis and châtelaines were sold alongside other luxurious trinkets, known as "toys," through which wealth and taste could be displayed. Some toys were functional, intended to store foodstuffs, cosmetic products, or snuff; others were intended for no purpose other than to delight. Some were made of precious metals, like gold or silver, and were sold at correspondingly high prices; others employed relatively inexpensive materials and were thus available to the expanding middle classes.


Enameled objects like this one, intended to imitate the lustrous quality of porcelain, were among the more affordable goods sold at toyshops across London and in fashionable English resort towns. Though often called "Battersea enamels" in common parlance (referring to the manufactory at York House, Battersea, operating only between 1753 and 1756), we rarely know exactly where individual pieces were made. The main centers of enamel production were in London, South Staffordshire (particularly in Bilston and Wednesbury), and Birmingham.


By the middle of the eighteenth century, technological innovations had made it possible to roll copper, instead of the far costlier gold, into very thin sheets. Powdered glass mixed with minerals (to determine the opacity and color of the enamel) would then be applied onto the copper sheets and fired at high temperatures. A design—whether a famous portrait, generic pastoral scene, or floral motif— could be painted on by hand or copied from an engraving through the newly invented process of transfer printing. Many enameled objects combined both methods of decoration and would be refired after the application of each new layer or color.