(b Ludlow, Salop, 1722–3; d 1801). English goldsmith. In 1738 he was apprenticed to the Huguenot goldsmith Peter Archambo. He first entered a mark at Goldsmiths’ Hall, London, in 1745, when he gave his address as Piccadilly, London, and became a freeman of the Goldsmiths’ Company in 1746. Some of Heming’s work is distinctly French in character, and this may be due to the influence of Archambo, seen for example in a pair of Neo-classical candlesticks (1769; New York, Met.). Nevertheless, Heming used an eclectic range of sources, from the designs for silver in Eléments d’orfèvrerie (1748) by Pierre Germain (Heming’s trade card depicts a ewer designed by Germain) to A New Book of Ornaments (1752) by Matthias Lock and Henry Copland (c. 1706–53). The curving table-feet depicted in the latter appear on Heming’s épergnes.

• Heming, Thomas
  • London, §IV, 2(i): Centre of metalwork production: Gold and silver
  • collaboration
    • England, §IX, 1(iv)(b): Gold and silver, 1730–80: Form and decoration
  • patrons and collectors
    • Williams-Wynn, Sir Watkin, 4th Baronet of Wynnstay
  • teachers
    • Archambo, Peter
  • works
    • Boulton, Matthew
    • Huguenots, §2(ii): Work and influence in England