Chats on Old Earthenware

by Arthur Hayden

In regard to decorated silver lustre we give two examples which are fairly typical of a large class. The illustration ([p. 431]) shows a jug decorated in enamel colours. The bird is in red and the foliage in green, on a cream ground. The border of the panel is in silver lustre and the rim of the jug and the bands around neck are also silver lustre.

This decorated silver-lustre ware is of two classes. The first class comprises patterns painted in silver lustre on a white ground, the foliage and birds and other patterns being in silver lustre, carefully painted over the white. As a rule in such pieces there is more white showing, and the lustre silver is palpably a decorative effect.

In the second class the silver lustre appears as a background, and the ornamental decoration is in white, covering the piece in most elaborate designs. This is known as "resist" ware, and on account of the great beauty and variety of its ornamentation, has strongly appealed to latter-day collectors. The pattern twining its way over the silver-lustre background may be white, blue, canary colour, pink, apricot, or turquoise-blue. White is most frequently found.

This second style is capable of the most intricate designs varying from farmyard and hunting scenes to ordinary conventional floral arrangements almost resembling the Japanese stencilled work in another field of art.

How "resist" ware is made.—If a white design is intended the ware is left white, but if any other colour, such as those we have mentioned, that colour is laid as a body or ground colour on the specimen to be lustred. The next step is to paint the exact design which later is to appear white, or blue, or yellow, on the surface of the vessel. This pattern is painted or stencilled on the ware with a substance composed of a glucose matter such as glycerine. The next stage is to apply the silver lustre to the whole surface which is allowed partially to dry. On its immersion in water the pattern painted previously to the addition of lustre peels off being on a soluble ground. The result is that the background of white or yellow or blue is laid bare, and the rest of the vessel is covered permanently with silver lustre. The adhesive lustre "resists" the water, adhering to the surface by means of its resinous nature, except in the pattern which peels off. Hence the term "resist" ware.

We illustrate one specimen of this silver-lustre "resist" ware ([p. 431]). It is of the ordinary floral conventional pattern probably stencilled on as described above. Some of the more elaborate specimens are painted. One of the finest collections of "Resist Silver Lustre" is that of Mr. William Ward, at the Kennels, Mellor, near Blackburn. It comprises examples that one may search for in vain in any of the museums. Many of the examples are marked such as "Warburton," or with the letter "W" impressed, and one specimen is marked "Leeds" a rare mark. The subjects of some of these jugs and mugs relate to the Napoleonic wars, and are dated. There is one rare jug entitled "Boney escaping through a Window," and in combination with this "resist" style are examples finely painted or transfer-printed in colours.

Copper or Bronze Lustre.—This class of lustre is generally held to be later (excepting of course the early attempts at Brislington which stand by themselves). It is held too by collectors up to the present not to offer such artistic possibilities as the "resist" silver lustre. This is amply borne out by the prices obtained at auction. But it must not be forgotten that this bronze or copper lustre varies very considerably. It may be and often is very coarse brown ordinary ware, and it may be very thin and delicate as to tempt the connoisseur to regard it with more than a passing glance.

In the highest forms of copper or bronze lustre, painted views appear in panels against the lustrous background, and such views are of a high order of merit. They may in all probability have been executed at Swansea. We illustrate a fine example ([p. 437]) of a large copper lustre mug with painted panel of landscape and other panels of fruit.

Very frequently in this copper lustre the jugs and mugs have ornamentation in relief which is enamelled in vivid colours. This is a fairly common form, and has been reproduced in very coarse examples, not to be confounded with the finer and thinner copper lustre at its best. We illustrate a copper lustre jug ([p. 437]) with serpent handle and Bellarmine mask spout, decorated in turquoise blue, and with basket of flowers in relief. The Goblet to the right is of similar decoration, and that on the left is of conventional coloured design on a mottled pink lustred band.

Marked Lustre Ware.—We have already mentioned a number of potters who are known to have made lustre ware, but the following names have been found impressed on the ware in various collections throughout the country, and may be of interest to collectors who have specimens either by these potters or by other makers not on this list. Wedgwood, Wilson, Warburton, Bailey and Batkin, J. Lockett & Sons, E. Mayer, Mayer & Newbold, E. Wood, Wood & Caldwell, Minton, Bott & Co., P. & U. (Poole & Unwin), Meigh, C. Meigh & Sons, Copeland & Garrett, and Leeds Pottery.