| |
Antique china sale and auctions in the
Antique Web!
A
Brief History of Wedgwood China
China Lovers Heaven: The
Staffordshire Potteries
by Mary Dessoie
A must for any china
lover is a trip across the pond to
Staffordshire area of England.
Staffordshire is the
historic area where "the potteries" have
reigned for over 300 years. The pottery
region is located approximately 150
miles from London and is easily
accessible by road, an excellent railway
system and two nearby airports in
Manchester and Birmingham. Manufacturers
such as Spode, Royal Doulton and
Wedgwood are household names for many
Americans. There are also hundreds of
lesser-known names associated with the
pottery industry in this region of
England.
Unfortunately,
numerous pottery houses experienced the
same demise as did so many in our
country: factories were in business for
a few years, or perhaps decades, and
then were either bought out or
dissolved.
Today, however, the
potteries are still very much the main
industry in the six towns that comprise
the city of Stoke-on-Trent: namely,
Tunstall, Burslem, Hanley (City Center),
Stoke, Fenton and Longton. The factories
in this area coexist in harmony with a
bustling tourism industry that revolves
around the business of producing fine
china and ceramics. Being there in
person, I had the chance to witness the
manufacturing process firsthand.
During my three-day
stay in Staffordshire, I visited the
Wedgwood, Royal Doulton and Spode
factories. All three offer excellent
behind-the-scenes glimpses into factory
life. As I walked through the factories,
I saw the creation of tableware and
figures from raw clay, extracted from
the cold gray hills of Cornwall, to the
beautiful finished products. So much of
the work continues to be performed
exactly as it always has been through
the centuries – by hand. It is a marvel
to observe the skilled craftspeople
demonstrate their techniques.
The Manufacturing
Process
At the Spode factory,
which has been at the same site since
1770, I was thrilled to have the rare
chance to witness the early production
stages in the manufacturing process of a
special order of 1,000 Spode butter
pats. These tours move at a fast pace
but as we passed by a work station with
those tiny plates stacked up, I insisted
on stopping for a closer look. We
learned that the exclusive New Bond
Street, London store Asprey, which is
frequently described as the "classiest
and most luxurious shop in the world,"
had placed the order.
Unlike some of the
mainly mechanical manufacturing process
of other potteries, all of the stages I
observed at Spode were performed by one
worker. The first step involved
individual cuts with a wire of a tube of
clay, which was approximately nine
inches long. Next, the worker slapped
each piece of clay onto a machine known
as a jigger. While the machine was
mechanically spinning and compressing
the lump of clay into he beginning
formation of a butter pat, he removed
pats that had been in a rotating oven of
approximately forty minutes and placed
the china pieces in the biscuit state on
bakery-type stacked trays. The worker
was in continual motion and no time was
wasted. He cut clay, three pieces on the
jigger, trimmed the excess for
recycling, removed pieces from the oven
and inserted the butter pats in their
basic form in the oven from the jigger
frame mold. This worker, who handled the
early stages of the china making
process, told me he could produce 1,600
butter pats per day. One day he would be
required to make butter pats and the
next perhaps tea cups. I left the Spode
factory with one unfired, nearly Asprey
butter pat and memories of an
unforgettable experience.
Cont'd
|
|
