12.2.4 Porcelain

Soft-paste porcelain

Britain’s elite too was caught up in the expensive craze for porcelain. As mentioned earlier, a more cost-effective method of achieving “British” style decoration on porcelain was to import pieces “in the white” from China and decorate them locally. Initially white wares were sent to Holland to be decorated, before William Duesbury, who was established as a decorator in London between 1751 and 1753, reportedly became the first user of overglaze painting in Britain. He mainly painted porcelain but also painted stoneware and figures. A contender for this claim who also operated in London was James Giles who ran one of the most accomplished workshops from 1743, firstly in Soho and then in Clerkenwell. He carried out painting on bought-in white wares, initially on Chinese porcelain, then Chelsea from 1760, but his finest work is said to be on Worcester bodies between 1765 and 1775. Some items of Chinese porcelain were also gilded in Europe.

Chinese whiteware decorated in London,
Kangxi cup with cockerels eating worms,
Qianlong sugar bowl decorated 1765-6, tea
canister decorated 1755-65 and saucer
decorated in Limehouse colours - courtesy
R&G McPherson Antiques

Qianlong white bowl decorated in London possibly
by James Giles, and Giles’s fabulous birds
- courtesy R&G McPherson Antiques
and Worcester Porcelain Museum

Kangxi white porcelain gold mounted and
gilded in France, 1720’s, and
Qianlong tea bowl and saucer added gilding
in England 1790-1800 - courtesy R&G
McPherson Antiques

Kings and nobles invariably sponsored early Continental porcelain factories, but in Britain it was mainly left to private enterprise from the start. Probably the first indigenous British soft-porcelain factory was founded in Chelsea around 1740/3, becoming prominent under Charles Gouyn, a jeweller, and Nicolas Sprimont, a French Huguenot silversmith. The soft-paste frit body they developed was similar to St-Cloud, but it was unlike Sevres soft-paste porcelain in that it was more difficult to refire successfully, so more difficult to decorate and a modified lead glaze was used. The earliest wares were moulded jugs in the form of goats with an applied bee decoration. The first brand mark on these “goat and bee” jugs was an incised triangle, but from about 1745 to 1749 it was painted blue.

Goat and bee jug
- source Brian Haughton

Unsurprisingly shapes were often copies of silver vessels, and a good example is the pair of crayfish salts dated to 1745-1749 that were based on a set of silver salts made by Sprimont in 1742-1743 for the Prince-of-Wales. About 1750 a new body was adopted and the brand mark changed to the anchor, which was in the form of a raised medallion until 1752. Painted scenes were introduced in this period together with figures of animals and birds. The next period had the anchor painted red until 1756, and this is considered the finest in Chelsea’s history. The anchor was then painted in gold to its closure.

Chelsea porcelain, early red anchor stand
1752-56, courtesy Juno Antiques, tea bowl and
saucer 1756-69 and pair of figures, gold anchor

Calcined bone was added to some bodies around 1755. Some craftsmen were recruited from Saxony, and by the middle of the 18^th century the quality of its wares was comparable to Meissen and Sevres. Initially Chinoiserie and Kakiemon (Japanese) decoration was common, and they also tended to copy Meissen wares until about 1760, then they produced very high quality decoration in the Sevres style with rich gilding and fine coloured grounds. Chelsea was patronised by Royalty through their orders, and the Duke of Cumberland also supported it financially. It specialised in meeting the expensive tastes of the nobility, so there was little plain underglaze blue decoration. William Duesbury of Derby purchased the Chelsea factory in 1769 when Chelsea’s major partner retired, and the period from then to its closure in 1784 is known as Chelsea-Derby.