Josiah Wedgwood, after serving an apprenticeship with his brother, and spending a few years with other partners, decided to start his own business. His early private experiments had already convinced him that he could create finer products than those of other local potters. He started by improving the quality of the wares he had made for his employers, conducting exacting and well-documented trials.
After many extensive tests of clays, other additives, and firing techniques, he created a fine, cream-colored earthenware with a multitude of uses. When England’s Queen Charlotte ordered a tea set in 1765 from Josiah’s pottery, she was so pleased with the Wedgwood product that she named Josiah “Her Majesty’s Potter” and allowed him to call the new stoneware “Queen’s Ware.”
Useful Wares
Early Queen’s Ware (also called Queensware or creamware) pottery was divided into “useful” and “decorative” categories, though the lines were sometimes blurred. Useful ware generally consisted of plain dinnerware and the myriad of scientific, kitchen, dairy, and sanitary items that today may be made from plastic, metal, or glass.
Wedgwood created items for chemists, physicians and apothecaries, including mortars and pestles, evaporating pans, retorts, tubes, syrup pots, apothecary jars, and sickroom equipment like spittoons, and thick drinking straws (called sick siphons) for bedridden patients. For the kitchen, the company created food molds and crockery; in the farmer’s dairy, sanitary dishes for making cheese, cream, and butter were offered.
Decorated Queen’s Ware
Dinnerware was also made from creamware, but with far more decoration than the strictly useful items. Hand-painted pottery was in demand, and colored transfers and other methods of decoration also became popular. The company became known world-wide when Empress Catherine of Russia commissioned a dinnerware service almost 1000 pieces of creamware, hand-painted with different English scenes. Sometimes called the “Frog Service,” each item included a crest of a frog, denoting that the dinnerware was for use at the Chesmenski Palace, which was located near Leningrad in an area that had been called “La Grenouillière,” the Frogmarsh.
Wedgwood created many other types of decorative earthenware, from majolica to variegated ware, to pearl ware. Josiah also experimented with porcelain, or bone china, producing some excellent pieces.
Wedgwood Jasperware
The best known Wedgwood product is probably Jasperware. Named for the semi-precious stone, jasper, this stoneware was invented by Wedgwood during the late 1700s, when interest in Classical artifacts peaked in the Western world. Jasperware was (and still is) used for cameos and pottery in the Greek, Roman, and Etruscan styles that graced the drawing rooms of all who could afford them.
The cameo, which includes a design of one color placed over another color on the same piece, was used for Wedgwood’s copy of the beautiful cobalt-blue glass vase known as the Portland Vase. Much painstaking work went into making a high-quality copy in Jasperware, and copies in various sizes are still much prized by collectors.
Colors of Wedgwood Collectibles
Other cameo-type pieces made by Wedgwood include medallions, plaques, vases, cups, teapots, tea caddies, and an amazing variety of objects. While many people have only seen items of pale blue (called Wedgwood Blue) with white decorations, there are many more colors and combinations of jasperware. A small commemorative dish showing Josiah Wedgwood was made in a muted lilac color. (See the illustrations at the end of this article.) Pink, sage green, black, yellow, darker blues, lilac, and the very rare crimson are just some of the other colors that have been used for Jasperware.
Josiah Wedgwood and Sons Pottery Today
After several generation of family ownership of the pottery, it merged with the Irish firm of Waterford Crystal, creating Waterford Wedgwood. The combined company developed major financial problems over the years, and in 2009 KPS Capital Partners, a New York private equity firm, purchased the Irish and UK units of Waterford Wedgwood. Thus the legacy of Josiah Wedgwood continues, hopefully far into the future.
Sources
- Josiah Wedgwood: the Arts and Sciences United, Josiah Wedgwood & Sons Ltd, Barlaston, England, 1978
- 18th Century Wedgwood, by David Buten. Main Street Press Book, NY 1980
- Wedgwood ABC but not Middle E, by Harry M. Buten. Buten Museum of Wedgwood, Merion, PA, 1964
- The Collector’s Wedgwood, by Robin Reilly. Portfolio Press, NY, 1980
- “Waterford Wedgwood bought by US equity firm KPS Capital,” Irish Times, 27 February 2009
More Articles on Wedgwood Pottery:
- Creation of the Wedgwood Jasperware Portland Vase describes how Josiah Wedgwood copied the original Portland Vase in jasperware.
- Dancing Hours Jasperware Plaques and Vases shows some examples and provides the background for this enduring design.
- Potter Josiah Wedgwood and Artist George Stubbs discusses the collaboration that produced unique paintings and stunning bas-relief pottery.
- Collectible Wedgwood Teapots and Tea Sets explains the development of tea services to complement the growing popularity of a drink introduced to England in the 1600s.
Katharine Garstka - Katharine Garstka specializes in genealogical research and in historical and genealogical writing.
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