Our first woddity of 2021 and something I’ve never seen before: A vintage porcelain china bathroom side table made by Standard, aka the Standard Sanitary Manufacturing Company, dated 1941. Thanks to reader Karen for this wonderful tip, and to the ebay seller New York Salvage for permission to capture these photos of this rare item.
Standard brand Darlington dressing table
There is a matching sink. Both pieces are on their original chromed legs. Beautiful Ming Green color.
I cannot find this porcelain china bathroom table top in any easy accessible online catalogs. But, the sink looks like a Standard Chesterton:
Update from reader Wink: A catalog page was spotted identifying the table as a “Darlington dressing table.” Darling, indeed. Thank you, Wink!
Here’s what NY Salvage says about the set:
Nice hard to find ceramic jadeite green porcelain console sink with matching side table and chrome plated brass legs and towel bars. The set is marked Standard and is dated 1941. The porcelain shows normal wear, minor scratches and scuffs. The untested attached faucet and drain assembly did come out of a working system recently. The chrome legs and towel bars also show normal wear, minor scratches and scuffs, they would clean up nice and have a bright shine with a polish. The original wall brackets are also included. Very nice rare and complete sink set. Please take into consideration these old sinks are very hard to photograph, the small minor defects do not show up in the pictures but can be seen in person. Overall very good condition. Please look over the pictures and ask questions when needed. Thanks for looking.
Shipping may be available, Please send us your zip code for a quote.
Measures approx.-Overall- 36″wide x 22 1/2″ front to back, with a 4″apronSide Table – 30″wide x 18″front to back, with a 4″apronBasin – 18 3/4″wide x 13 1/2″depth x 6 1/2″deep(4 1/2″fill height)Faucet valves- 12″ apart on centerTowel bars – 18″ 3/4″squareLegs are adjustable 26 1/4″ up to 28″, and have a 7/8″diameter
The bottom of the little table.
Where to buy the set (buckle up, the seller knows these are rare and has priced accordingly):
- 1941 bathroom sink and matching table by Standard Sanitary Manufacturing Company from NY Salvage on ebay.
- And, NY Salvage always has lots of interesting finds to look at, check them out here.
minor thing – the image labeled “The bottom of the sink.” appears to be the bottom of the side table. A part of the underside of sink is visible on left edge of image. Very interesting items, would not have seen these otherwise. Thanks for the views.
Hi John, oopsy, fixing it right now.
I’ve bought from them through eBay in the past. Rest assured they knew how to pack it for Sage shipping.
That color is divine!
Have never seen one of these, yet what a practical idea, especially for homes of that period. I can also see it being used as a small dressing or makeup table.
Just beautiful. I’m sure they’ll quickly find a good home.
I remember seeing those in the old motor court cabins that lined the US highways that ran thru cities and small towns back in the 70’s and 80’s.
Perhaps this was a solution to not having counter space in bathrooms with a console sink.
That lavatory is exactly what I’d like when we renovate my bathroom. It even has wide-spread taps. Center-set faucets are so darn hard to clean around.
Thanks for posting this pair of items, Pam. Actually I’m not sure I should be thanking you after going down the rabbit hole of looking through NY Salvage’s multiple EBay offerings!
I particularly liked this one:
“Vtg Mid Century Jadeite Ceramic Pink Porcelain Vanity Bath Sink Retro 648-20E”. Price $895.
The undercabinet needs a fair bit of restoration work, but I love the pink sink/countertop. I would have a spot for it (in my in-laws’ old house), but then I’d need the pink toilet, and the complete one that NY Salvage has is just too massive. No low-flush there!
I do have a question you might be able to answer from the depths of your experience. I kept noticing the descriptor “Jadeite”. At first I thought it was to do with green-colored items (see yours above), but the word turned up for other colors, even for items that weren’t green (see my item). Is it is a type of porcelain? A trade name?
Your thoughts?
And thank you anyway for introducing me to a source of interesting vintage items.
Hi Penny, I am not an expert but I think of Jadeite. Specifically, I first became familiar with it as a color for vintage dishware. Googling quickly, I found this story >> https://estatesales.org/thegoods/jadeite-jadite-jade-ite-guide
Interesting, it’s like we’re seeing one of those rare ‘inbetweeny’ fossils of a dinosaur with feathers on it! There seems to have only been (just from my memory) a short period of time where people played around with different ways of providing counter space before the modern configuration of sink-set-in-counter top became standard and the transition from free standing sink was complete.
Looking at it, you can kind of guess why, casting a large object in porcelain is probably harder and more expensive and needed to be shipped more carefully than tiles or some kind of laminated counter top, so it makes sense it didn’t become the go-to surface. And then, you get all the storage space under the counter if you make it part of a piece of furniture.
Here, you can see they got rid of the bulky porcelain pedestal and replaced it with metal legs so that does make the sink less massive, but then they added more porcelain around the edges to give some extra space to set objects. And that general idea did seem to be the next evolution in sinks after the pedestal style. But setting the sink in a counter as they did in later years allowed sinks to still have a good basin, but use even less porcelain. I wonder how much shortages in the post-war housing boom played in to changes in sink set ups.
Stunning color. Wow. And a beautiful , yet practical solution to extra counter space needs in a smaller room. I love this. I wish I was building or remodeling.
Instagram’s @VintageBathroomLove account recently posted (Jan 18) a catalog page showing the Chesterton “lavatory” and matching Darlington “dressing table.” An item I’m never seen before, and now twice in two weeks!
Thanks, Wink !