Customer Reviews

Warman's Sterling Silver Flatware: Value & Identification Guide

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As a collector of sterling flatware, I found little I could use in this book. I'll have to admit that I loved the introductory pages. Phil Dreis is very knowledgeable about the silver market. He also lists most patterns and supplies pictures, but he does not include the most collectible serving pieces. You won't find ice scoops, tomato servers, olive spoons, horseradish scoops, etc. He does show profiles of such pieces at the beginning of the book. In the actual listings under the pattern names, he does not refer to the difference in cost due to the age of the item although he does make mention of that in the introduction. This might be a good resource for a novice but not for a collector.

This is the finest price guide ever written on silver. It identifies more patterns than any other book out there in an easy to use format. SUPERB!! As an avid silver flatware collector, I use this book every single day. This book is a huge improvement over the first edition.
THANK YOU PHIL DREIS from ANTIQUE CUPBOARD! Your expertise is appreciated!!

This purchase was a dismal disappointment. I just built a new but small, storage warehouse and I wanted an adequate reference manual in both the warehouse and my office. I deal solely in very old American sterling pieces and sets. Yet, when I tried to find 9 obsolete patterns in this book... only 3 were in there. I found them easily in Tere Hagan's reference guide.

I've ordered another used Tere Hagan book for the warehouse and Warman's Sterling Silver Flatware Guide will probably be used for shredded packing fodder.

Sorry Mr. Warman... you need to make sure that your book is as complete as possible... plus... what would be the harm in listing patterns by the year that they were made instead of alphabetically? If I knew the pattern name, I wouldn't need your book.

This guide is overall a disappointment. Far too much space is devoted to inferior makers like International Silver and Lunt, and not enough to the makers that are actually worth collecting (a few examples out of many that could be listed: Gorham's Sphinx pattern is not even included, nor many Tiffany vine patterns and the Tomato/Exposition pattern). The photos are mostly of poor quality, and the prices were hopelessly out-of-date almost as soon as the book was published (but do give some indication as to RELATIVE values, nonetheless). The single most irritating aspect of the book is its systematic exclusion of prices for many key categories of pieces, such as dinner forks and knives (arguably more important than LUNCH forks and knives). The chief value of this guide lies in its potential for revision, through further compilation and professional editing, into something far more useful and complete. Dreis has taken a step in that direction, at least, and for that I give him great credit.

This guide is an absolute necessity for those who still care enough to collect sterling flatware. While the value section is less important given today's increases, the illustrations feature many more obscure patterns unseen in other guides.