Description:
English creamware globular teapot with a cover decorated on two sides with identical heart-shaped, relief reserves of a pineapple flanked by seven serrated leaves, all issuing from a vase. There is a band of acanthus leaves around the pot rim, and the reserves are framed within scrollwork and foliage, and set against a fine-ribbed relief basketweave ground. The cover has a flower finial over a molded basketweave pattern encircled by a band of acanthus leaves around the rim; the attached handle and spout are decorated overall with a molded basketweave pattern. Enoch Booth (c.1703-1773) of Tunstall, England, developed the fine, light-colored earthenware now known as creamware in the early 1740s using the various improvements in body, glaze, and firing; but it was Josiah Wedgwood (1730-1795) who perfected and successfully marketed the ceramic body. Wedgwood’s version of creamware resulted from many experiments with white clays and improved glazes; by 1762, he had developed a light, sturdy, refined, and yet inexpensive cream-colored earthenware body. Wedgwood described the new product as "a species of earthenware for the table, quite new in appearance, covered with rich and brilliant glaze, bearing sudden alterations of heat and cold, manufactured with ease and expedition, and consequently cheap." Middle-class consumers rushed to purchase creamware, bringing the popularity of alternative ceramics such as tin-glazed earthenware and salt-glazed stoneware to an end. In an effort to capture a segment of the creamware market, many English potteries also began to produce the ceramic; estimates suggest that more than 150 factories in England manufactured the ware. Unfortunately most early wares were not marked, making attribution to a particular factory difficult. According to Leslie Grigsby, wasters (discarded shards) from different molds with relief pineapple-and-basket-weave grounds were excavated at the William Greatbatch factory waste site at Lower Lane, Fenton, and date from 1765 to 1782. This popular pattern was also produced with minor variations at several Staffordshire factories, as well as at Cockpit Hill and other Derbyshire factories. The most common survivors are in lead-glazed earthenware (pattern is also found on contemporary salt-glazed stonewares), and this design with a pineapple surrounded by rococo scrolls occurs with a variety of handles and spout types. See HD 2006.33.33 for a coffee cup and saucer in a variation of this pattern. Condition: Small chip to inside cover, restoration to tip of spout, and at the attachments of the handle to the teapot body.
Link to share this object record:
https://museums.fivecolleges.edu/detail.php?t=objects&type=ext&id_number=HD+2006.33.38 |
