Postmodern Silver-Plated Coffee and Tea Set with Ebony Handles, Attributed to Lino Sabattini, Italy, 1980s

Story

Lino Sabattini spent sixty years proving that silver could be sculpture. This set is the evidence.

A two-piece postmodern coffee and tea service attributed to Sabattini and produced in Italy, circa 1980s. The taller coffee pot and lower tea pot share the same vocabulary — clean conical forms with sweeping horn-shaped handles carved from solid ebony. The contrast between the reflective silver plate and the dark, warm wood is the entire design: two materials, in conversation, with nothing else to distract.

Lino Sabattini was one of the defining Italian metalsmiths of the twentieth century. After establishing his own workshop in Milan and attracting the attention of Gio Ponti, he became closely associated with Christofle in the late 1950s and early 1960s before founding Sabattini Argenteria. His work is represented in major museum collections, including the Museum of Modern Art in New York. The sculptural geometry of this set places it firmly within the language of late-twentieth-century Italian design, though in the absence of a visible maker’s mark, the attribution to Sabattini remains just that — an attribution.

This set dates to circa the 1980s.

Both pieces are in good original estate condition with minor cosmetic wear to the silver-plate finish — the honest evidence of a set that was used, not just displayed. The ebony handles are intact and beautiful.

This belongs on a sideboard, a credenza, or a dining table where the rest of the objects are chosen with the same care.

Origin

Italy, circa 1980s. Attributed to Lino Sabattini. Silver plate with solid ebony handles. The set comprises a coffee pot and a tea pot.

Details

Two-piece coffee and tea service in silver plate with solid ebony handles.

Dimensions

• Coffee pot: H 8" × Dia. 4" × W 8"
• Tea pot: H 5.5" × Dia. 6" × W 9"

Condition

Good vintage condition. Original, unaltered. Both pieces show minor cosmetic wear to silver-plate finish, consistent with age and use. Ebony handles intact with no chips or cracks. No dents or structural issues.

Sourcing Note

I found this set at auction, and it spoke to me immediately. I’ve always been obsessed with 1980s Italian design — a place and an era that seemed completely unafraid of asymmetry, geometry, strange proportions, and abstract forms.

This set has all of that. The severe silver shapes, the sweeping ebony handles, the slightly improbable silhouettes — it feels unmistakably of that moment, when Italian designers were making useful objects that also behaved like sculpture.

There was something about the pair together that created an atmosphere before I had even fully studied them. That is usually the signal for me. Some objects ask to be understood first. These simply had presence.