Object of the Day: A Bi-fold Card for H. O'Neill & Co.

Please click the image to enlarge.  It's really quite pretty.

This embossed chromolithograph beauty is like the Queen of the Trade Cards. A bi-fold, die-cut card, it’s only printed on the obverse and opens to reveal two portraits of 1880s lasses in all their finery. Expertly printed, the card has all the bells and whistles. Aside from its brilliant color and embossing, it also sports metallic gold ink for added dimension. The publisher was Sackett, Wilhelms and Betzig of 145 and 147 Mulberry Street in New York.

Since the illustrations do not include specific mention to a product or to the business in question, we can deduce that the card was produced to be customized at the printer after being selected by the advertiser. In this instance, the card was selected as a premium by:

H. O’NEILL & CO. 

321 to 329 

SIXTH AVENUE 

COR. 20th ST.

*  

NEW YORK 

Image from the
Flatiron 23rd Street Partnership
Flatironbid.com

That’s rather a good location and, a large store, so it’s safe to say that the store was quite successful. Let’s see what we can find out about the store. An 1886 ad tells us that the business located in the handsome cast iron building with its impressive towers, central pediment and intricate corbels (the building remains to this day, thankfully) was once the home of a mercantile opened by Hugh O’Neill which marketed ““Fine Millinery, Fancy Goods, Lace & Gloves, Etc.” Well, that rather explains the emphasis in the images on the card—hats and trimmings as well as baubles, gloves and fans. The business was a champion of printed advertising and circulated hundreds of thousands of yearly catalogs as well as beautiful, collectible cards such as this one. An organization devoted to this part of New York—the Flatiron District—offers this photo of the building. You can learn more at the website of the Flatiron 23rd Street Partnership: FlatIronBid.com.

The name of the vendor is printed in the two golden roundels beneath the portraits of fashionable young ladies. Each is adorned with a popular subject of the era—one, a singing birdie, and, the other a nosegay. The whole thing is just so wholly Victorian and lovely I can hardly stand it.