In-depth Articles

This odd-looking Dutch Delftware form is called a “monteith.” Monteiths were large bowls with scalloped rims that allowed wineglasses to suspend in chilled water. Their first appearance in 1683 is described by Oxford diarist Anthony à Wood (1632-1695), who wrote: “This yeare in the summer time came up a vessel or bason notched at the…

The initial donation of a Delft eighteenth century plate in 1882 to the Pennsylvania Museum and School of Industrial Art (renamed the Philadelphia Museum of Art in 1918) provided the foundation for a collection of Dutch earthenware that now numbers over one hundred andtwenty five pieces. The unusual orange and blue decoration of this circa…

Blue and white vases with spouts filled with multi-colored flowers are a stunning visual sensation. Perhaps due to their exclusive ownership and the short-lived nature of flowers, only a few depictions exist of how these vases were used in the late seventeenth century. An important visual source for their use is seen on two embroidered…

By around 1660 the fame of the Delft faience potters had spread far beyond the borders of the Dutch Republic. Delft earthenware was a prized possession of European monarchs. One such example is provided by the Delft dishes with coats of arms created for the court of the powerful French king Louis XIV. Under this…

In 1950 The Metropolitan Museum of Art received two earthenware plaques from R. Thornton Wilson (1886- 1977). These pieces were part of an important gift of European porcelain and faience collected by the donor specifically for the Museum. In fact, some of the best examples of Dutch Delftware in the Met’s holdings came from the…

The blue-and-white ceramic was long sought and loved worldwide, particularly since the introduction of Chinese blue-and-white porcelain in Europe in the fifteenth century. The arrival of Chinese porcelain triggered European potters to produce imitations of this unique Chinese product since the seventeenth century. In Delft, the imitation process first occurred in about 1620-1630 when a…

Located in the Boulogne hinterland, Desvres has been producing pottery since Gallo-Roman times. The town, which now has a population of 5,000, welcomed its first earthenware factory in 1764–65, before seeing the rise of industrial-scale production during the nineteenth century, which peaked in the following century. Its famous tiles cemented its reputation well beyond the…

A robust international trade network brought all types of exotic treasures to the Netherlands in the seventeenth century. The two major trading groups were the Dutch East India Company (VOC) and the Dutch West India Company (WIC). These powerful entities discovered many treasures, commodities and delicacies from faraway lands that were uncommon at the time…

Delftware objects were commonly given as gifts to commemorate special occasions as early as the seventeenth century. During the reign of King William II and Queen Mary, Delftware objects were gifted to the nobility across Europe. The tradition continued even after the death of Mary in 1695, when King William gave many of the late…

The dinner table, as with all aspects of the decorative arts, is subject to changing fashions. As the structure of meals has evolved over time, the table settings and decoration have followed suit to complement the variations in each tradition. Beginning in the fifteenth century, a formal meal became increasingly divided into numerous courses. Typically,…