A retailer label is a printed paper label, stamped mark, plaque or engraved signature identifying the shop or firm that sold an object, rather than necessarily the workshop that made it. Such labels are commonly found inside drawers and on the backs of furniture, on clock dials and movements, on lighting, under silver and ceramics, and in the lids of boxes and cases.
In the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries many famous names, including department stores, court suppliers and fashionable furnishing houses, retailed goods bought in from specialist makers and applied their own name. A clock dial signed by a London retailer may house a French movement, and a cabinet bearing a store label may have been made by an anonymous trade workshop. Retailer labels are nevertheless valuable evidence, helping to date and place a piece and often adding to its appeal when the firm was prestigious. Collectors should check that a label is consistent with the object in age, wear and position, since labels can be moved or added. A partially surviving label is usually best left in place, cleaned only lightly and protected, rather than removed or replaced.
