Antique Laundry blue box - Helvetia Blue from Talissot & Chevalier in Dôle and Geneva
Period: 1890-1905
Box containing 6 gold-plated “coins” made of blue wash, resembling the iconography of Swiss coins and medals from the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
Beautiful blue and gold illustration on the box.
Your box will be sealed: never opened in 120 years
Antique Laundry blue box - Helvetia Blue from Talissot & Chevalier in Dôle and Geneva
Period: 1890-1905
Also known as Guimet Blue (its inventor, or washing blue, azur blue, etc.)
Box containing six gold-colored pieces of blue dye for bleaching laundry, resembling the iconography of Swiss coins and medals from the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
Your box will be sealed: never opened in 120 years
At a time when laundry was done by hand and then in a washing machine, it was sometimes difficult to achieve perfect whiteness. It was noticed that a very light blue dye could revive the whiteness of the laundry.
This is how azure blue or laundry blue was born.
In 1828, a chemist from Lyon, Jean-Baptiste Guimet, invented artificial ultramarine blue. This invention reduced the manufacturing cost tenfold, allowing for widespread use in France and also for export. This made Guimet a fortune, and he left us the superb Guimet Museum of Asian Art in Paris! The English also called it “Paris blue,” for example.
It was often sold in the form of blue balls in a box.
But here we are dealing with a true work of art, if I may say so.
The blue was compressed into the shape of a 5-centime coin and bronzed: the manufacturer compressed it with bronze or brass powder to give the illusion of a real coin! The blue color shows through the gilding.
At the end of the 19th century, there was a desire to ennoble industrial products by giving them the appearance of precious objects, hence the imitation of coins here.
Very aesthetic but also practical, as it prevents the blue powder from staining your fingers when you pick it up.
The product was extremely well designed and crafted for a simple blue washing tablet!
These coins are impossible to find today.
Beautiful blue and gold illustration on the box
Box dimensions: 8x5cm Coin diameter: 3.5cm
Salamander - Pharmacy corkscrew in bronze
XIXth century
Antique 19th century pharmacy bottle
Radix althaeae Off - Marshmallow
Mastic of Chios
Antique pharmacy bottle - Wide-mouth apothecary jar.
19th-century mouth-blown glass
There is still some product left inside
A fascinating artifact from the history of pharmacology
Plate - 19th century colour engraving from Natural History
By Morris, circa 1870 - A History of British Birds
Birds Eggs - In colour
English Litharge - POISON - Lead oxide
Nineteenth-century medicine bottle with beautiful black and gold label
Blown glass
Box of nascent oxygen and cocaine tablets
From the 1900s to the 1950s it was not uncommon to see cocaine as an ingredient in some lozenges, especially for throat ailments!
EMPTY
Atlas of descriptive anatomy of the human body
Anatomy board
By Doctors Bonamy and Paul Broca
Draftsman: Emile BEAU
Published on July 1st 1854
Mineraline by Dr C. Baud
Antique tin pharmacy box
Powder or talcum powder for children's toiletries
Butterfly - Natural History color plate
Entomology
You buy 1 plate, not the whole set
Antipyrina Knorr
Named after its German discoverer: Ludwig Knorr
Pharmacy jar - Herbalism - Apothecary bottle
Late 19th century
Antique bezoar - Antipoison - Antidote
Once sold by the apothecary, bezoar, also known as gallstone, was reputed to have the same anti-poison properties as the legendary unicorn's horn, hence its excessively high price, also due to its great rarity.
An important piece in a cabinet of curiosities
Sold alone - Without stand, sold separately
Cremor tartari sol - Cream of tartar
Potassium bitartrate
Pharmacy jar - Herbalism - Apothecary bottle
Late 19th century
Infangyl Carlier
Antique pharmacy bottle - Apothecary
The box still contains its full, sealed bottle and instructions
Portable autopsy kit from the mid-19th century
Maison Charrière in Paris, circa 1845–1870
Mahogany case for autopsy and dissection
Small portable mahogany case containing a set of autopsy instruments: hook hammer, bone chisel, enterotome scissors, probes, hooks and suture needles. Used by forensic scientists and anatomists for opening and examining bodies.
Charrière, a major 19th-century Parisian manufacturer, was a pioneer in the design of high-precision surgical and anatomical instruments.
Mahogany and polished steel: 23 × 11 cm
Please note: crack in the wood under the case
A beautiful object, very rare to find
Strychnine - Arsenic
Antique pharmacy bottle from the early 20th century
Green label: POISONOUS SUBSTANCE - CODEX 1908
This means that this bottle had to be kept separate from the others as it was extremely dangerous and lethal - POISON
EMPTY
Antique Laundry blue box - Helvetia Blue from Talissot & Chevalier in Dôle and Geneva
Period: 1890-1905
Box containing 6 gold-plated “coins” made of blue wash, resembling the iconography of Swiss coins and medals from the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
Beautiful blue and gold illustration on the box.
Your box will be sealed: never opened in 120 years
