Unique Cookie Cutters

Collecting unique cookie cutters from earlier years is a hobby that is affordable and fun. Most vintage and antique cookie cutters can still be used to make delicious tasting treats. They also look wonderful displayed in a beautiful glass jar on a kitchen counter, hung on a Christmas tree or in groupings on a wall or arranged into a decorative wreath or swag.

Throughout history, cookie cutters have always had a special place in the hearts and kitchens of people worldwide. It is believed that cookie cutters in various forms have existed since approximately 2000 B.C. when the people of Mesopotamia and Egypt used ceramic molds for their sweet little treats. Over the course of dozens of centuries, cookie molds evolved into intricately carved shapes and designs fashioned of wood. By the 1500s wooden molds were very popular in the regions of mid Europe.

During the next century people started making cookie cutters, finding simple cookies were easier to decorate then those with the fancy designs of the cookie molds. By the end of the 1700s, tinsmiths began making cookie cutters. With the Industrial Revolution came mass production of cookie cutters with the first documented catalog offering cookie cutters dating from 1869. By the 1900s many companies offered cookie cutters through retail and wholesale catalogs.

There were many changes made to the manufacture of cookie cutters during the 1900s.

• 1905 - companies began using cookie cutters as a form of advertising importing many from

Germany

• 1920s - mass production of aluminum cookie cutters
• 1940s - plastic cookie cutters were made and the Educational Products Company began making 100,000,000 cookie cutters
• 1970s - a resurgence of the craft of tinsmithing with interest in making a variety of different styles of cookie cutters

Over the years there have been many types of unique cookie cutters. The following are examples of a few of the unusual vintage and antique ones.

• A fabulous vintage red plastic cookie cutter of Reddy Kilowatt a popular advertising character for electric companies from the 1920s through the 1940s. Reddy Kilowatt was featured in advertisements, comic books and educational films. His purpose was to sell the idea of electricity to homeowners.
• A rare find, these tin and wood cookie cutters are in the shapes of a rooster, a rabbit and a chick. The wood backs are made soft pine with tin nailed along the sides using tin square nails. These three cookie cutters, auctioned by Conestoga Auction Company on June 7, 2008, at Live Auctioneers, sold for the following amounts:
  • Rooster - $600
  • Rabbit - $450
  • Chick - $300
• Found on Ruby Lane is a miniature set of seven shaped cookie cutters complete with their original storage tin dates from the late 1800s. Imagine a little Victorian girl pretending to bake cookies like her mother or playing house with her favorite doll. The tiny cutters fit into the tin which measures just two inches in diameter.
• Two vintage pressed aluminum cookie cutters, a Christmas tree and a boot
• Two tin cookie cutters form the late 1800s, a three inch fish and a 2 ½ inch Scottie dog
• Complete with its original box, this five piece beige plastic cookie cutter set from 1981includes a snowman, a bear, a car, a fish and a train. The set was made by the Hutzler Manufacturing Company.
• Two large tin cookie cutters from the early 1900s, a lion measuring 4 inches by 3 inches and a fish measuring 5 ½ inches by 2 ½ inches.
• An adorable 1990 red plastic squirrel cookie cutter from Hallmark

There are also many unique and unusual cookie cutters currently being made including the following.

• The once bitten cookie cutter looks as if a bite has already been taken.
• A leg lamp cookie cutter
• A rat
• Gingerbread men that look as if they have already had a leg, arm or head bitten off.
• Dollar sign cookie cutter

Collecting unique cookie cutters is a fun hobby that the entire family can enjoy.

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