The Ring Tray by the Chase Copper and Brass Company’s specialty line. A recent weekend find.
It’s been a while since I had such good luck at a thrift store. But that changed over a recent weekend. Chris and I feel that the best strategy for thrift store finds is to go often. Their stock is always changing so the opportunity for a find is good. I’ve been on the hunt for a Chase Ring Tray for several years. I last came across a one in a Massachusetts antique store in 2015. The condition was poor and it even had a crack in the rim and with a price of $40.00 I passed on it. Finally one turned up at my local Savers thrift store for only $2.99. This tray is not in perfect condition, it has a lot of surface scratches. But it is in better shape than the one I didn’t buy in Massachusetts.
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- Savers thrift store in Webster, New York. Photo from stores.savers.com
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- The housewares section of Savers in Webster. Photo from stores.savers.com
The Chase Ring Tray, designed by Harry Laylon (1911 – 1997), was introduced in 1936. It stayed in production until the discontinuation of the entire Chase Speciality line in 1942, when the civilian use metals started to be requisitioned for the war effort. The tray had a retail price of $2.50, which is the equivalent of $45.00 in 2018, which seems pretty hefty.
It is easy to see how the ring tray got its name.
The 1942 Chase Specialty catalog described the 12 inch diameter tray this way:
This round tray is a happy medium in size, neither too large nor too small for general use. The high rim keeps things from sliding off, and the flanged edge is a continuous handle. The bottom has an etched design.
The underside of the Chase Ring Tray. This shows the flanged edge that made for easy griping.
Originally Chase sold the tray on its own. Then from 1937 – 1941 it was paired it up with the Blue Moon Cocktail Shaker (Howard Reichenbach, Designer) and the Laylon designed Blue Moon Cocktail Cups. I bought my first ring tray about a decade ago from Pine Hills Antique Mall in Adamstown, Pennsylvania. I used that tray to completed my Blue Moon Cocktail set.
The Chase Blue Moon Cocktail set 1937 – 1941.
In the years between my first ring tray and my next, I started acquiring the pieces of the Chase Comet Coffee service. At the March, 2015 Pier Antique Show in Manhattan, I picked up the Comet Coffee pot. Designed by Walter Von Nessen (1899 – 1943) in 1938, he also designed the Kent Sugar and Creamer, which I picked up the next year. Now the ring tray completed the set.
My now complete Chase Comet Coffee Set.
Originally retailing for $14.50 ($261.50 in today’s dollars) the coffee set now sells between $200.00 to over $1,000.00 (which in my opinion is way, way too high). And just last year one set sold, in an online auction, to the one and only (and lucky) bidder for $35.00.
The Chase Comet Coffee set, 1938 – 1942.
Personally I like going out into the field and searching for Art Deco, rather than buying online. It’s finds like the ring tray that keeps me going back to thrift stores again and again. Bargains are still out there, so happy Deco hunting.
Anthony (A Freakin’, Tiquen’ Guy)
If you like this post check out these earlier ones:
Do You Know the Muffin Man?
Hunting Deco in thrift stores and junk barns