The naturalistic motifs central to the eighteenth-century Rococo aesthetic assumed an even greater prominence as the style was reinterpreted a century later. Gorham’s morning glory pattern, probably known at the time as Convolvulus, is one of the most beautifully articulated expressions of nineteenth-century America's infatuation with nature. This ladle’s bowl is pierced to suggest ivy, complementing the three-dimensional leaves that serve as a transition between bowl and handle. The Victorians often assigned symbolic significance to flowers; one con temporary source couples the morning glory with coquetry.

Related examples: Fennimore 1984, no. 39; Venable 1994, p. 122.

Book excerpt: David B. Warren, Michael K. Brown, Elizabeth Ann Coleman, and Emily Ballew Neff. American Decorative Arts and Paintings in the Bayou Bend Collection. Houston: Princeton Univ. Press, 1998.