Paul Storr

Paul Storr was born in 1771, apprenticed to the Swedish-born silversmith Andrew Fogelberg, and registered his first mark in 1792. From 1807 he worked for the royal goldsmiths Rundell, Bridge and Rundell, whose workshop produced the largest commissions of the age: services for the Prince Regent, presentation plate, racing trophies and the enormous wine coolers that still surface at auction. He left Rundell’s in 1819, worked with John Mortimer from 1822, and retired in 1838. He died in 1844.

What to look for

His mark is PS in a rectangle with cut corners, struck alongside the leopard’s head, lion passant, date letter and the sovereign’s head duty mark. On Rundell’s pieces the Latin inscription “Rundell Bridge et Rundell aurifices regis et principis Walliae Londini fecerunt” is engraved under the base.

The style is Regency neoclassicism at full weight: gadrooned borders, acanthus, lion’s paw feet, and cast and applied ornament rather than thin chased decoration. Pieces are heavy. A Storr teapot weighs twice what a provincial one of the same size does.

What moves the price

Weight and scale, the presence of the Rundell’s inscription, an armorial that can be traced to a known commission, and condition of the cast ornament. Later replacement handles and re-gilding lower the figure. Pairs and sets carry a premium over the sum of their parts. Flatware by Storr, which exists in quantity, sells for far less than hollowware and is where a new collector can start.

The marks, in order

Storr registered a succession of marks across his working life, every one of them reading PS. What changes is the punch: the shape of the surround, whether the corners are cut or square, the spacing of the letters and the presence of a pellet between them. A reference book of registered marks is the only way to pin a punch to a period, and the assay office registers are the source those books are drawn from.

Period	Working as	What sits beside the PS
1792 to 1796	On his own account, Church Street, Soho	London marks; no duty head before 1784 is irrelevant here, so expect the sovereign’s head
1796 to 1807	Storr and Co, then in partnership with William Frisbee	London marks
1807 to 1819	Head of the Rundell, Bridge and Rundell workshop, Dean Street	London marks, and on the grander pieces the Rundell’s Latin inscription
1822 to 1838	Storr and Mortimer, New Bond Street	London marks; retailer’s name engraved on some pieces

The date letter is what fixes the year, not the maker’s mark. Read the row in the usual order with the hallmark identifier, then check the PS punch against it: a mark and a date that belong to different periods of his career is the first sign of a problem.

What comes up, and what it makes

Storr worked at every scale, and the range between the ends of it is wide.

• Wine coolers, centrepieces, tureens and presentation plate. The commissions that made his name, mostly from the Rundell’s years. These are the five-figure lots.
• Teapots, coffee pots, jugs and sauce boats. The middle of the market, and the pieces most likely to come out of a house rather than a collection.
• Salvers, waiters and dishes. Value follows diameter, weight and the armorial.
• Flatware. Storr made a great deal of it. A single spoon by him sells for a fraction of a piece of hollowware of the same weight, which is where a collector starts.

Weight tells you more than the mark alone. Storr’s work is heavy, and a piece that feels light for its size wants explaining before anything else.

What is not a Storr

Three things get sold as Storr and are not.

A retailer’s name is not a maker’s mark. Rundell, Bridge and Rundell sold work by many hands, and their inscription on the base says who sold it rather than who made it.

Later copies of the Regency style were made in quantity from the 1880s onward, and some carry a PS mark of their own from an unrelated maker. The date letter settles it.

Electrotype reproductions of famous Storr pieces were produced by Elkington and others. They carry no assay marks at all, which is the tell.

Where to check

The Goldsmiths’ Company holds the London registers and its library answers enquiries about marks. The Victoria and Albert Museum and The Metropolitan Museum of Art both hold catalogued Storr pieces with photographs of the marks, which is the quickest way to compare a punch against a documented one. The price records give illustrative hammer ranges for comparable pieces.