Tiffany's $1,200 Dish Designed for the Ages

NEW YORK (TheStreet) -- If you're concerned with how your table looks this holiday season, skimp on the settings. If you're hoping those same items will be around your great-grandchild's table, $1,200 a dish is a strong investment.

Tiffany & Co.(TIF Quote) purchased the Atelier Le Tallec porcelain studio in Paris in 1991, but didn't jump into the bespoke tableware business until last year. The artisanal beta testing ranged from commemorative platters to 400-piece sets at $1,200 or more per item.

"Every customer we've had has said they want it passed on through our family," says Allen Nissim, Tiffany's group director who oversees the custom Le Tallec business. "It's very much in the back of the minds of our customers that these are very special pieces that are going to be part of their family's patrimony and heritage."

The complicated designs of Tiffany's custom china can take six months to complete.

Tiffany's focus on high-quality products have helped spur sales as smaller rivals have gone out of business. (Buyers may also be interested in the auction of disgraced financier Bernard Madoff's wares.) In the first six months of the year, 917 jewelry companies discontinued operations, almost double last year's number, according to the Jewelers Board of Trade, which tracks about 30,500 retailers and suppliers. Citigroup(C Quote) analysts initiated coverage on Tiffany's shares last month with a "buy" recommendation. The stock has surged 42% in the past three months, bringing a gain to 81% this year.

Tiffany's merchandise can require a great deal of patience. While china producers like Haviland, Pickard and Wedgwood often have templates in place when designing settings for royalty, presidents and executives, Tiffany customers who wanted a pattern based on an etching of the family home or a piece of fabric spent a month hashing it out with designers.

Starting from a blank slate (or porcelain, in this case), complicated designs can take up to six months to complete. That's just the first step. The pattern is then sent to Paris, where the 14 women of Le Tallec's artist group take up to 10 hours tracing the pattern and preparing pigments. Each artist has spent at least 20 years studying Le Tallec's various patterns and a hand-painting technique that dates back to the 18th century -- no decals.