C20Ceramics

Oct 21

Cinque Ports Pottery

I came across the striking vase in the first images recently, and was immediately attracted to it. From the distance I thought it might have been a piece of Lapid Israel pottery, but on closer inspection it turned out to be British – by Cinque Ports Pottery Ltd, The Monastery. It is a pottery I knew next to nothing about so did a quick bit of research and in the process found some quite lovely pieces of British Mid Century pottery. (Cinque Ports is a historic series of coastal towns in Kent, Sussex and Essex U.K.)

Cinque Port Pottery was founded by David Sharp in 1956 with George Gray…the name was later changed to Cinque Ports Pottery Ltd and changed later again include the name of the operating premises at “The Monastery” when George Gray took over this incarnation of the pottery in 1964, after an amicable split between the two owners.

In the 1980s the pottery was handed over to a Jim Elliot, first trading as Cinque Ports Pottery, without the ‘Limited’, then later as Cinque Ports Ltd, without the “Pottery”

The pottery operated until July 2007 until its final closure.

From what I can see the pottery was a high quality slip cast, and appears to be stoneware fired or at least high earthenware fired. Some of the output reminds me of Briglin Pottery London, and other pieces remind me of the potteries of Cornwall and Rye. As I mentioned earlier it also reminds me of Lapid Pottery, with its use of hand painting, and high quality stoneware fired, slip cast pottery.

If searching for this pottery online the autocorrect of many search engines will change to totally unrelated things – the worst in case is the Etsy search function. To get any results on the Etsy search function you need to use the words “Cinque Port Pottery” to get any results.

The names and locations of this pottery can be a bit confusing, but you can read a more comprehensive history on the Studiopottery.com site or in the book “The Potteries of Rye: 1793 Onwards, Carol Cashmore” pub 1999 if you can locate a copy. (out of print)

Cinque Ports Pottery, The Monastery, Vase 1970s, Photo Ray Garrod

Cinque Ports Pottery, The Monastery, Backstamp

Oct 7

Rorstrand “Palett”

Rorstrand “Palett” is an impressive and bold design, which appears to be from the late 1960s or early to mid 1970’s, but sadly its designer is not known. It has elements in the design that many of the designers at Rorstand during this period used.

The design features hand painted bands in warm ochre hues with a blue circle as the centre of the design on most forms. There appear to be some variations on this theme – but at this stage I’m not sure if they are Palett or other named designs so will leave that idea alone for now.

It seems a hard design to find, and there are not a lot of images of it online, and they consist mostly of plates or bowls, but I did manage to find a photo of a cup that was for sale below.

It is also a difficult word to search for also, as even in quotation marks “Palett” changes to other spellings on search engines. If anyone comes across the designer listed in some archive, book or other publication I would love to know.

Rorstand Palett – Photo Ray Garrod

Rorstand Palett Backstamp

Sep 29

Rorstrand Blue Fire – Hertha Bengtson

Hertha Bengtson designed “Blue Fire” for Rorstrand Sweden in 1949, and it was in production from 1951-1971. It became a hugely popular design both in Sweden and internationally with its sweeping and bold biomorphic forms, and intense blue glaze.

It was the first major dinner service designed by Hertha, who unlike many of her peers had a strong interest in the design of dinnerware.

It is a slip cast earthenware porcelain with a subtle and quite beautiful moulded herringbone pattern which isn’t always apparent at first glance.

Some pieces of the dinnerware are in bright white, contrasting with the intense blue of the other forms. It was also released with a deep red coloured glaze. I have read that it was also released in a grey and a green – but haven’t been able to find any record of those colours.