Several pottery works were established in Spain in the 18th century, all of them, in the same manner as the earlier fabriques, modified the system of decorating their wares. In some instances the colours and designs of Italian maiolica were imitated, others copy the blue faïences of Pisa, Genoa, and Savona, while others adopted the styles of Moustiers, Nevers, and Rouen, or English earthenwares.

Ten or twelve manufactories existed at Toledo in the 17th century which imitated Talavera ware; in the 18th they hardly produced anything of importance. Ignacio de Velasco in 1735 founded one at great expense at Toledo in which imitations of Genoese pottery were chiefly made. At the death of Ignacio in 1738, these works passed to his son George; in 1742 Francisco Hernandez directed them, and in 1747 imitated Japanese models. Several specimens proceeding from Toledo, at the South Kensington Museum, painted blue on a white ground, in the style of Savona and Japan, belong to this period.

In 1755 thirteen pottery kilns existed at Puente del Arzobispo near Toledo; they still worked in 1791, but their productions were very inferior in artistic merit.

Earthenware pottery was made at Segovia from a very early period, chiefly for domestic use, until a manufactory was founded by two brothers—Manuel and Tomás Ledesma in 1752—they had seen some specimens which were made at Bolonia for Isabel Farnesio, the widow of King Philip V., and they endeavoured to imitate them. In 1774 they tried with a most unsatisfactory result to imitate English wares. This industry fell into decay towards the end of the century, and only ware of a very common description was made there.

Talavera ware was also imitated at Zamora. At the middle of the 18th century works existed there where pottery was made in the manner adopted at Alcora with few results, for soon after it was established the master potter, who was at the head of these works, left the locality. ["Memorias," Larruga, Vols. 13 and 34.]

The further we advance into the 18th century, the more we find the tendency in Spanish ceramic art to imitate the pottery most in vogue in other countries. Francisco Cavalli, a potter of Ruidoms, won a prize at Tarragona in 1787, for his excellent imitations of brown and white Genoese ware. [MS. fol. Bibl. de S. Magestad el Rey, S. 2, E. B. pt. 8.]

The efforts made by King Charles III. towards increasing industrial arts in Spain, contributed to the reproductions and efforts made to imitate foreign wares. When the king founded in 1768 the villages of La Carolina and La Carlota in Andalucia, he ordered that pottery works should be set up there. At the same time that he established at Madrid the important porcelain manufactory of Buen Retiro, he wished that earthenware works should exist in the same locality, where specimens should be made in imitation of the best work produced elsewhere. The king was most anxious to revive to a great extent the almost extinct industry of metallic lustred pottery, and thanks to this we are able to know most accurately the receipt and manner in which this lustre was applied. In the same volume in which I found these documents, [Brit. Mus. MS. Egerton, 507], are two reports addressed to Count Florida Blanca in 1786, by Iriarte and Vargas, who were instructed to facilitate the development of this industry. The first report contains information relating to the pottery works of the county of Stafford; the second tells us that in the building of San Isidro el Real, essays had been made to reproduce English wares, and the lustred productions of Manises, with an idea of establishing inside or outside of Madrid pottery works on a large scale, under the protection of Count Florida Blanca. Iriarte and Vargas were of opinion that these works should be established far from Madrid, suggesting as the best spot El Viso in La Mancha, owing to the excellent quality of the clay. Don Sebastian Schepers, a son or brother of Cayetano Schepers, was at the head of these works. Cayetano was the chief modeller at the Retiro manufactory. Their imitations of English earthenware did not succeed; the varnish turned out badly, and they determined to bring out English workmen. Their imitations of gold lustred ware were eminently successful, so much so that competent judges declared it was equal to what was made at Manises. Pottery works where earthenwares of different descriptions were made existed also at this time in Madrid; the best were those of Rodriguez and Reato, mentioned in Larruga's "Memorias Economicas."

At the end of the 18th, and beginning of the 19th century, Valencia and Aragon supplied the country with painted tiles. One of the finest examples of this class which have reached us is the pavement of the chapter house of the cathedral of Saragossa, on which landscapes, medallions, and animals are finely designed in the Italian renaissance style. In a shield may be read the following inscription:

Reals Fbcas
D E
Dª Maria Salb
adora
Disdier
Bru ft
Año 1808.