What Can I Do With My Coat of Arms? Part 18 - In the Dining Room

Now, where were we?

Ah, yes, in the dining room, finishing our armorial table settings. Having last time looked at ways to include your heraldry on the china and silverware on the table, today we're going to look at various armorial drinking ware.

Now, such drinking vessels may be of glass etched with your coat of arms:

Or you may "kick it up a notch" by going all out for pewter or silver goblets adorned with your heraldry:

And in the center of the table, or if you have more than one, several placed strategically around the table, you can have the armorial "table salt", a small dish of ceramic or metal used to serve the salt which your guests may choose to add to their meal:

If you look back over the past several posts about the use of your heraldry in the dining room, you should be building quite an image of how many different ways you may display your coat of arms and/or crest there.

But wait! There's more.

Next time, we will finish up our table settings with a few more armorial items, and as a bonus, include a couple of lower cost ideas for your consideration.

What Can I Do With My Coat of Arms? Part 17 - In the Dining Room

Now, having looked a places in the dining room to place heraldry directly on the table, as a table decoration, and the serving dishes, we now come to that part of the dining experience that I expect many of you have already seen in one place or another as a way to display your coat of arms in the dining room: the dining china.

This most commonly takes the form of the plates, which may be decorated with heraldry in any one of several different ways, both fancier with complete (or nearly so) armorial achievements:

And somewhat more "low key", with the owner's crest and monogram:

And not just plates, but bowls may be so decorated:

And let us not forget, as I am sure many of you have not, the silver service at each place setting. You will no doubt notice that, owing to its smaller size (and thus less space for such engraving, that most silverware carries just the crest of the owner:

And to complete each place setting, we have the armorial napkin ring ...

... and knife rest, a useful and elegant way to keep knives from soiling the tablecloth:

Next time, we will finish off the place settings with what you have probably already noticed is missing in this post: the glassware.

What Can I Do With My Coat of Arms? Part 16 - In the Dining Room

Having looked at ways to turn your dining room table into a display of heraldry on its own, today we're going to see how your coat of arms might be displayed on the various serving dishes and service ware in the dining room.

Naturally, one of the first items that springs to mind is the service platter or serving tray. While many such platters are created in silver and pewter, the example here is done in brass.

Other serving pieces, for example, a soup tureen, can include a display of your coat of arms.

Of course, you and your guests will need something to drink with your dinner. How about a nice cup of coffee served from an armorial coffee service, accompanied by its own armorial tray?

Or, in a look back at more genteel days, an armorial cider jug.

This one has the arms, helmet, mantling, crest, and motto on the upper portion of the jug. And in the photo above, the crest has become the handle for the lid.

And, of course, wine often accompanies a dinner. Yours could be served from a beautiful etched glass armorial wine decanter.

Look around your own dining room. What serving items can you find that could be a display of your coat of arms?

What Can I Do With My Coat of Arms? Part 15 - In the Dining Room

Having looked at a few ways to use your heraldry in the kitchen creating food, today we're going to start looking a ways to use your heraldry where that food is eaten: the dining room.

Why don't we start with what is usually the largest piece of furniture in the dining room: the dining room table.

There are several different ways that the dining room table can be used for a display of heraldry.

The first, of course, is the table itself can be such a display, like this table which has the arms of the municipalities in the Canton of Glarus, Switzerland, painted onto its surface:

Too much, you say? Well, maybe you're right.

How about something a little less "in your face"? For example, a tablecloth with embroidered coats of arms on it? Here are a couple of examples of ways this might be done.

Still maybe a little excessive? (Though, "Extremism in the pursuit of moderation is no vice" according to one comedian.)

Well, then, how about just an armorial table carpet or table runner?

As you can see from these examples, there are a number of ways to turn your dining room table into a display of heraldry.

What Can I Do With My Coat of Arms? Part 14 - In the Kitchen

The kitchen has often been called "The Heart of the Home". Is it also a place where you can find uses for your coat of arms and/or crest?

I hope to give you a few inspirational ideas about that today. For example:

Cakes baked in the kitchen have often been used as a way to display one's heraldry. Examples of such range from the fairly simple to the quite complex, as you will see in the examples below:

(This last was the christening cake of Princess Maria-Carolina of Bourbon Two Sicilies, now the Duchess of Calabria and Duchess of Palermo, back in November 2003.)

Of course, it's not just the cake itself that might be a display of heraldry, as in this example:

I can only assume that the armored knight, above and in detail below, is there to help prevent any early noshing on that cake.

And what else gets baked in the kitchen and could also serve as a display of heraldry?

That's right, cookies! Either plain ...

... or frosted.

They don't all have to be decorated with real coats of arms, either. The examples below have been used to teach some basic blazon terms in a fun, and delicious, way.

And finally, we come to another tasty way of displaying heraldry: Chocolates!

Cakes, and cookies, and chocolates, oh, my! Okay, now I'm hungry!

Next time, we'll look into a room that is usually kitchen-adjacent and see how heraldry can be used there. See you in the dining room!

What Can I Do With My Coat of Arms? Part 13 - In the Home Library

So, libraries have books, and what other kinds of articles do you often find need of with your books? Or more specifically to our ends here, what other kinds of armorial articles do you need for your books?

A reasonably obvious one, of course, are bookmarks. Because you need to be able to find your place again, right? Have you ever thought about having or creating a bookmark with your heraldry (either your arms or, in the example below, your crest) on it?

And what other items, suitable for heraldic display, do you often find need of in your library?

Why, bookends, of course!

And bookends, as a form of armorial display, can take any of a number of different forms using several different media, as the four examples below will, I trust, adequately demonstrate.

Here we see, tooled leather armorial bookends:

Bookends covered with embroidered arms:

These bookends can be handmade and painted:

Or you can even go for full-metal castings with decorated shield and sword:

Here, too, there are as many different forms and styles as your imagination can invent. There are just about no limits as to what you might do!

Next time, we'll start looking at how to use your heraldry in the room that many consider to the the "Heart of the Home". Surprise, it's the kitchen!

What Can I Do With My Coat of Arms? Part 12 - In the Home Library

Having looked at a number of ideas for using your coat of arms in your office, today we're going to start a two-part look at using heraldry in your library.

Please keep in mind that while the examples we are going to present here are usages that relate specifically to a library area, many of the suggestions we have made for other parts of the house could be just as appropriately used in the library as well.

So, to begin:

The most obvious feature of a library is, naturally enough, the books contained within it.

One particularly nice, albeit very expensive, way to include your coat of arms is to have them painted into an old-fashioned book of hours, like this:

Or to have your heraldry tooled or engraved on the covers of books.

But those two methods, however appropriate, are generally in excess of the budgetary constraints that most of us have.

Still, do you know what is a great way to heraldically mark your ownership of these books? Why, armorial bookplates, of course!

Heraldic bookplates can and do take many different forms. The examples given below are from a range of years and of several different styles, but here, too, their formatting is really limited only by your own imagination. So let's look at these as a starting place for inspiration, and not limit ourselves to just those types we see here.

These last three examples are ones that I have done for myself, by customizing some heraldic clipart that I purchased on-line.

Do you find any of these examples to be a source of inspiration for how you might use your own coat of arms to create one or more designs for heraldic bookplates?