Crispe’s China.—Crispe of Bow Churchyard is said to have had a manufactory of china ware at Lambeth in the middle of last century; and to him John Bacon, the sculptor, is stated to have been apprenticed in 1755. But little is known of this manufactory of Crispe’s, but reference to him and to his connection with the china trade will be made in another part of this book.
Several other potteries—one carried on by Mr. Northen, who was an apprentice to Mr. White of Fulham—existed at Lambeth, but have been removed, like the “Imperial,” by the improvements on the banks of the Thames.
Blackfriars Road.
The terra-cotta works of Messrs. M. H. Blanchard, Son, & Co., were established in 1839 by Mr. Blanchard, who served his apprenticeship with Messrs. Coade & Sealey at Lambeth, and they are still carried on by him and his sons and other partners under the above style.
The terra-cotta goods manufactured by this firm are of remarkably fine and good quality, and consist of vases, tazzas, statues, busts, groups of figures, brackets, pedestals, terminals, crosses, fountains, balustrades, trusses, and every species of architectural enrichment. In 1851, and again in 1862, as well as at the Paris Exhibition, Mr. Blanchard was awarded medals for his terra-cotta goods, and they are considered to be among the best produced, either in this country or on the Continent. Among the more successful of the works executed by them may be named the terra-cotta for the Brighton Aquarium; the permanent buildings, South Kensington Museum; the columns, &c., of the arcades in the Royal Horticultural Gardens; the Charing Cross and Cannon Street hotels and termini; the Grosvenor mansions; the Grand Hotel, Cairo; and the chastely beautiful and effective enrichments of the Wedgwood Institute, Burslem. Of this last, as one of the greatest achievements of ceramic art, as applied to external decoration of buildings, I give a series of engravings. The principal features of these designs are a series of twelve nearly square panels, in alto-relievo, representing the months of the year—each month being represented by a seated, recumbent, or stooping life-size figure, with the attribute of the season; and a series of oblong panels or plaques, representing, in similar relief, all the more striking details of the work of the potter, thus, very appropriately, illustrating the staple trade of the district in which the Wedgwood Institute is situated. Of the months, the four illustrations here given (Figs. [364 to 367]) will convey a correct idea.
Fig. 364.
Fig. 365.
