Some useful information if you are considering starting to collect sugar tongs:

Perhaps the first question to ask about starting a collection of Georgian Silver Sugar Tongs is "Why Sugar Tongs?". This is a very fair question to ask & let me outline some reasoning:

In the current economic climate, the decision about what to invest and where can be very difficult. We hear of many horror stories about all kinds of investments. Many of us have been bitten by falling stock market prices or falling property values which begs the question where can we be sure that we won't lose our money. We need to save, for retirement, for a rainy day, for our children or for many other purposes, so what is the safest way to save?

There is no one right answer to that question, perhaps £5 notes under the mattress are still the best bet! Some will buy Gold or Jewels, but one very good possibility is Antiques. Antiques have one over-riding advantage and that is that the supply is limited. By definition, there are only so many of a particular item available and that number gets smaller as time progresses and items disappear, are lost or are thrown away.

Once the decision has been made that Antiques would be a good way to invest, the next difficult question is "What kind of Antiques?". Most of us are not experts. This means that we probably cannot tell the difference between a fake and the real thing. This sets one to worrying whether we might spend a large amount of money on (say) a picture or piece of furniture, only then to find it was fake. To be fair, most reputable dealers will not allow you to do that, but it is always a risk.

The next issue is that most of us are not rich. This means we do not have large sums of money that we can spend on a particular item. It also means that the impact of a mistake is very significant if we have spent a lot of money on one item. We are starting to narrow the field considerably. We are looking for something that does not cost too much and that will relatively easily enable us "non-experts" to be sure we have the real thing.

If we have followed that reasoning thus far, then a very good answer to those issues is silver. Genuine silver is hallmarked and there are many publications around to help you identify hallmarks, (for a list of some useful books click here. This means that if you can identify the hallmarks, then you can determine the date (approximately) and be sure you are buying a genuine antique.

The next question to address is the one of affordability. Antique silver can be very expensive, but usually only if you are buying something very old, very rare or very large. This then leads us to start considering the less expensive items of silver. There are collectors of every kind of small item of silver, but particular favourites are: