Collecting Carvacraft

Many PHS members have come to concentrate on one particular area rather than seek to cover the whole field of plastics collectables. John Hockey's speciality is items made from Carvacraft cast phenolic, and here he describes how this interest came about.

It all started over 15 years ago, I had for some time been interested in Art Deco as an art form and also in old plastics items. A career move to a moulding company in 1978 (GPG, now part of LinPac) rekindled my interest. In the way that fate has of throwing up interesting happenings, I found myself looking round an old bric-a-brac shop in Ampthill, Bedfordshire in the autumn of 1980. There, sandwiched between a minstrel-boy money box and a boile-handled pewter teapot was a dusty, honey-coloured plastics desk pad holder with Art Deco patterns carved into it. On turning the item over, I found the magical Carvacraft logo impressed in gold on the underside with the endorsement 'A Dickinson Product'. Further along on the same shelf was a honey-coloured pin and clip tray also attractively carved in the Deco style and also with the Carvacraft logo. The two items together cost me the princely sum of £6 and 1 was hooked!

Further sorties to Kimbolton and Bedford in 1981 and 1982 provided two more articles for my collection: a double inkstand and a single inkstand both with a delightful sweeping design to the sides and with sliding inkpot covers on top. I now had four items of Carvacraft and it was starting to look as if 1 had the beginnings of a desk set. All were in the honeyed hue, although the double inkstand was almost yellow.

I could simply have gone on collecting but, as with most collectors, I wanted to know more about the subject. The logo had intrigued me and it was clear that the endorsement 'A Dickinson Product' together with the desk-set connotations of paper-related activities pointed towards what was now the Dickinson Robinson Group, DRG. In 1984 1 wrote to DRG and the reply I received exceeded my wildest dreams. In addition to the information that John Dickinson had made plastics items for the war effort 1939-45, the Publicity Manager included a copy of a 1948 directory complete with a full description of 'Carvacraft Writing Desk Equipment for the Modern Business Executive', photographs of the main pieces for the office suite, details of Carvacraft for the home, and the prices for each item 'inclusive of purchase tax'.

A number of things suddenly became clear. First, these goods were made in the late 1940s and consequently were some fifteen to twenty years after the Art Deco period. Second, there were some 25 items in the complete range and I only had four of them! There were also other questions posed by the text. Who was the designer referred to as 'one of Great Britain's leading authorities in industrial design"? Why had I not seen examples of the other colours that the Carvacraft range came in - Honey Mottle I knew, but where were White Onyx and Green Mottle?

Gradually over the years I began to collect more of the range, attending collectors' fairs in Nottingham and Dunstable. In 1986 1 was lucky enough to see and purchase a green pin/clip tray and single inkstand. Further 'finds' included a paper knife, double inkstand, propelling pencil and hand-blotter. The prices were by now starting to rise and at the last fair in Dunstable (1990) a friend secured an ash-tray and a pair of bookends for me but had to pay £40.

By pure coincidence, my wife was at that tinie working on a project with a senior executive of DRG who kindly gave her a book entitled 'The Endless Web' containing the history of John Dickinson & Co Ltd. There were two special surprises in this book which enhanced my interest in Carvacraft. First there was a reference to the Plastics Department. 'ln July 1946 a Works Committee was formed at Croxley to discuss and advise on matters relating to production and efficiency .....’ A note adds that by March 1949 it was making pens, pencils and other plastics goods, although it closed down little more than a year later. Second, the final illustration in the book, on the last page, is of J. W. Randall, managing director, 1944-55. At one corner of the desk at which he is sitting is the unmistakable sweeping curve of a Carvacraft desk item, probably an inkstand. This surely is a ringing endorsement of the company's plastics products of the time.

I have noted from 'Art Deco Collectors' Style Guide' (1987) that the designer was C. E. Boyton. I also note that the value of my collection (which still represents less than half the items) is now worth around £350! As these items were produced for a relatively small time and seem to be in short supply, I shall continue to collect them. I am fortunate to have a list of all the items made during the 1940-49 period and if anyone has any further information (or samples) 1 would ask them to contact me.