The Paris firm Halphen was created in 1850 by two brothers, Maurice and Charles Halphen After three years, Maurice Halphen left the business, and the firm was renamed as C. Halphen et Cie (Charles Halphen and Co.) with Charles Christofle being a principal shareholder The main product of this enterprise was the silver-plated cutlery As a base metal for silver-plating, home-made Alfénide metal, a copper-zinc-nickel-iron alloy (with component relative compositions of 59:30:10:1, respectively) was used The Christofle firm was vitally interested in such cooperation as, up to 1878, it could not manufacture any silver-like metal for subsequent silvering and was forced to use brass as a base metal in most of its products
In 1888 Christofle bought the Halphen company
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