Klinkosch J. C.

1822 – Vienna – 1888

Viennese Silversmith

Son of the bourgeois and later imperial and royal court silversmith Carl Klinkosch (1797 - Vienna - 1860).
In 1848 he married Elisabeth Swoboda, daughter of the k. k. court and bourgeois jeweler Wenzel Johann Swoboda.
Learned from 1835 to 1839 with his father in the gold, silver and metalware factory Mayerhofer & Klinkosch in Vienna, Leopoldstadt, which was under his management. On November 10, 1843, he was awarded the trade of a bourgeois silver worker, and on January 25, 1844, he also received the citizenship of the city of Vienna. After study trips through Italy and probably other European countries, he took over partial management of the factory from his father in 1847 and sole management from 1853. From 1860 to 1861 he was a member of the Vienna City Council. After the retirement of his partner Stephan Mayerhofer Jr. in 1869, he became the sole owner of the company, which was now run under the name J. C. Klinkosch. In the same year he was awarded the title of k. k. Hof- und Kammer-Lieferant. Josef Carl Klinkosch was able to make the factory internationally known through his work based on designs by well-known artists such as Theophil Hansen and Gustave Deloye, as well as his participation in the world exhibitions in Vienna in 1873 and Paris in 1878. He was awarded the Knight's Order of the French Legion of Honor and the Iron Crown Order III Class, which was also associated with elevation to hereditary knighthood, for a magnificent shield commissioned by Emperor Franz Joseph I and exhibited at the latter. In 1884 he retired from business for health reasons and handed over the factory to his two sons Isidor (1852 - Vienna - 1914) and Arthur Ritter von Klinkosch ( 1854 - Vienna - 1899). After the end of the First World War the company was sold to Berndorfer Metallwaren-Fabrik Arthur Krupp A.G. and closed only in 1953. Josef Carl Klinkosch was a member of the guild's committees and board of directors and a shop steward from 1851 to 1883.

Ref.: R. Price (ed.), Wiener Silber, Modernes Design, 1780 - 1918, Ostfildern-Ruit, 2003, p. 389