Jug of The Month - December

At my mum's in Birmingham for Christmas and found this on the shelf above the cooker in the kitchen. A Myott Festival jug from the 1970s. Love the long handle.

Mum bought it from ebay - she used to own a tea set like this ....

 

...and is now wondering why she got rid of it. If we're both now reclaiming our brown and orange ceramic past through ebay we'll need a system to make sure we're not bidding against each other.

Jug of The Month - November

I was forced to bid for this on ebay when I was teaching Britain Since 1930 and studying the work of Clarice Cliff. My class had explored her patterns and shapes, and designed their own tea service. Then we got onto the subject of being a collector. We thought about whether we would collect a particular pattern, such as crocus, or a shape, like a conical sugar sifter. We looked at ebay to investigate prices and it seemed only natural at this point to demonstrate the bidding process to my class. I set a limit and didn't win for a while, but then I won this spring crocus jug. Hooray! Collecting Clarice Cliff with Ms Corbett. I'm sure that qualifies as history, ICT, art, design technology, citizenship, PSHE and numeracy. But not PE.

I also won an autumn crocus saucer. Then I stopped bidding.

Look at these lovely brush marks.

I watched the 1985 Channel 4 videos "Pottery Ladies. Miss Cooper, Miss Cliff, Miss Rhead and all the forgotten girls...... " for my dissertation research. They are excellent and I would love to have my own copies. Highlight for me is Ethel Barrow with her hair set for the TV talking about producing patterns and HER name going on them. The Art Director - Clarice in this case - got the credit. Ethel then aggressively paints a conical sugar sifter to prove her point. Here's Ethel Barrow in the 1960s...

And here she is in 2000 when she was 90 years old...

This is from the Clarice Cliff Collectors Club...www.claricecliff.com/features/ethel_90th_birthday/index.shtml

"Originally Ethel was doing all the Crocus flowers, Cissy Rhodes did the leaves, and Clara Thomas the banding. Suddenly though, they were incredibly busy, and a special ‘Crocus shop’ was made on the floor below the Bizarre shop. The team was enlarged and each girl given a specific colour to apply, to speed up the painting to cope with demand. Ethel did the orange flowers, two girls did blue flowers, two purple, there were two ‘leafers’ and two finishers.

At this time the Crocus name was written on the ware above the backstamp by the ‘leafers’ which is why it is in green. The girls at this time were Nellie Webb, Doris Thirlwall, Clara Thomas, Ivy Stringer, and Winnie Pound. They were all on pieces work so the faster they painted the more they earned!”


The pottery ladies..the forgotten paintresses...


Annie Clews

Cissy Rhodes

Clara Thomas

Doris Pemberton

Doris Thirlwall

Eileen Moore

Ethel Robinson

Ethel Steele

Florrie Winkle

Gladys Broad

Gladys Brown

Ivy Ford

Ivy Stringer

Joyce Phillips

Mary Dayson

Mary Harper

Nellie Harrison

Nellie Hill

Nellie Webb

Nora Dobbs

Peggy Davies

Phyllis Norris

Rene Burton

Rose Cumberbatch

Winnie Pound

Throwing

I've been back on the wheel after a year. There are some lovely new MA people this year, who are throwing beautiful big jugs and jars and bowls and mugs and whatever takes their fancy. I am throwing in my usual serendipitous style. Kafut. Recycle. Kafut. Recycle. A jug! A jug! A jug!

Jug of The Month - September

It's not September. Bit late with this one. October will be over in 10 minutes time. I go back to university tomorrow. Hope I can remember how to do this...

Jug of The Month - October

A 5oz Poole Pottery jug from the Traditional range. With a sweet dish to match...

My jug pattern is LE and the paintress is marked with an L? Or a V? I've looked at all the decorators' marks at the back of my book but I can't work it out...

Perhaps my jug was on Nellie Blackmore's to do list during this painting demonstration...

Leslie Hayward's book Poole Pottery talks about post war production at Poole where painted ware was "the most characteristic Poole product. Advertisements and magazine illustrations featuring these wares began to appear form 1951, and in that year the painted patterns, to be known increasingly as traditional, were graded elaborate, medium and simple." The company were working with "the design legacy of Truda Carter." This pattern sheet is from 1951 and shows the LE pattern...

and the elaborate designs have been simplified on this pattern sheet from 1963...

I love the clarity of the brush marks on my jug...

Here is an illustrated price list from 1969...

And two more 5oz jugs in the same shape from the twin tone range...

Jug of the Month – August

I'm a child of the 1970s, and was raised in a brown and orange house. Carpet, curtains, sofas – bold brown and orange patterns. G Plan sideboard and dining room furniture in a heavy browny orange wood. How do you make wood so orange? I loved this sideboard with the drinks cabinet on the right. And in the cupboard on the left lived lots of brown and orange ceramics!

I’m not sure if we owned this Hornsea jug...jug of the month...

 but we had lots in this Saffron range – salt and pepper pots, vinegar jugs, tea, coffee, flour and biscuit jars.

Hornsea Pottery produced Saffron from about 1970 to 1992. It was designed by John Clappison who had studied at Hull College of Art. Here he is...

According to the Hornsea Museum website. “Its distinctive caramel, orange and brown colouring helped it to become very popular and it was sold in very large quantities.” A popular choice then Mum. Wonder if everyone else had a caramel, orange and brown house to match?

The pottery had lots of visitors in the 1950s and turned part of the site into a theme park, with “a model village, birds of prey exhibition, car museum, a large adventure playground in the style of a wooden fort, remote control boats and go-karts.” How lovely!

Think I need to visit Hornsea Museum, which has over 2,000 pieces of pottery dating from 1949 to 2000. Check out their website at http://www.hornseamuseum.com/

Grandma and Grandad pushed the boat out with a hint of green amongst the brown and orange in their Hornsea Bronte ware.

Here's some Hornsea in the V&A, with a Portmeirion coffee pot lurking in the background...

And some other Hornsea things I like...