Wedgwood Drabware Part Dessert Service

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Regency

Circa first quarter 19th century, 1800–1825 | England

An exceptionally rare early nineteenth century antique Wedgwood drabware part dessert service (see The Gen). Comprising three leaf-shaped dishes, six round plates and one oblong dish. Each piece is moulded with overlapping leaves in low relief to represent geranium leaves laid on a wickerwork plate in the highly collectable drabware glaze. The veins are enriched with fine gilt “well put on [and which has stood] admirably the test of time and wear” (see The Gen). A truly exceptional collection and highly coveted by collectors.

DIMENSIONS: Round plates diameter 20 cm, leaf-shaped dishes width 21.5 cm, and oblong dish length 25.5 cm, height 2 cm.

SIGNATURES, MARKINGS & INSCRIPTIONS: Impressed WEDGWOOD, O and cyphers (plates); Impressed WEDGWOOD, L and cyphers (oblong dish); and Impressed WEDGWOOD, N and cyphers (leaf-shaped dishes).

CONDITION: The dessert service is in excellent original condition with wear commensurate with antique age and use. There is no evident restoration. The six round plates are all in excellent condition. The oblong dish has some very faint wear to the gilding. There is a slight chip to base of one of the leaf shaped dishes, two visible hairlines to another and the final dish has a slight chip to the underside of the rim.

REFERENCES: For an example of similar service see Christie’s, 21 October 2014, Lot 14 and see a similar plate at Victoria & Albert Museum, Accession Number 2457-1901.

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THE GEN

Eliza Meteyard, in the Wedgwood Handbook, states that: “Wedgwood did more than any other potter of his time, and as much as the potters of the present day, for the improvement of articles connected with the service of breakfast, tea and dessert”. She goes on “the beauty of form and the perfection of colour finish render the more ornamental portions of Wedgwood’s dinner and dessert services in cream-colour most desirable objects for the collector. Many of the centre pieces, fruit baskets and dishes, plates, saltcellars, mustard-pots, cream and jelly cups and spoons are perfect gems of art. It is hoped, with the advance of public culture, that this beautiful coloured ware will resume its old place on our tables, and thus supersede the ugly dead white hues of modern services. Very fine specimens of full toned cream ware were made at Etruria during the first decade of the present century, and of these there are examples in both Jermyn Street and at South Kensington.” And further on the gilt, “Much of his useful ware in dinner, dessert, tea, and coffee services was finely gilt ‘a pierced and gilt service in cream-ware was perfection. His gilding was rich, well put on, and stands admirably the test of time and wear’.” (Wedgwood Handbook: A Manual for Collectors, Eliza Meteyard, George Bell & Sons, 1875, pp 18, 225 and 398)

“The Drab can sometimes confuse collectors as it was produced in two different forms: Stoneware and as glazed earthenware. Drab tableware was introduced in 1820 as a stained earthenware. The colour was closer to brown than to the olive of Drab Stoneware. The look and feel closely resembles the Creamware of the time and shared similar composition. Drab can be referred to as a type of stained Creamware, often referred to as drab Queen’s Ware. The earliest examples are closer to brown in colour, with the same delicate lightweight feel as early Creamware. Drab tableware ceased sometime in the 1860s due to a movement towards whiter tableware.” (Wedgwood Ceramics, Daniel J. Keefe III, Schiffer Publishing Limited, 2005, p. 191)

“‘Drab’ is the name given to a distinctive greenish-brown ware made by Wedgwood in two different bodies: a stoneware and a stained earthenware… The stoneware was sometimes produced as a dry body, but usually with a smear-glaze, from about 1819. A beautiful saltglazed drabware has been made in Staffordshire from about 1720. Wedgwood’s early-19th century drab body was a stained version of the white stoneware body described as ‘porcelain’ and the drab body was therefore called ‘drab porcelain’ to distinguish it from the similarly stained coloured body.” (Wedgwood, The New Illustrated Dictionary, Robin Reilly, Antique Collectors Club, 1995, p. 140)

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