{"product_id":"open-sponge-blue-rim-plate-in-cream-earthenware-deeply-aged-crazing-unglazed-base-with-a-painted-decorators-tally-c-1880-1905","title":"Open-Sponge Blue Rim Plate in Cream Earthenware, Deeply Aged Crazing, Unglazed Base with a Painted Decorator's Tally, c. 1880–1905","description":"\u003ch3\u003eThe Piece\u003c\/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eA large cream earthenware plate with a soft blue sponged edge and a lifetime of crazing in the glaze.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe form is plain and generous: a wide flat well, and a rim that \u003cstrong\u003eturns up in one continuous soft curve\u003c\/strong\u003e with no moulded edge, no scallop and no relief anywhere.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe glaze is a warm cream-white rather than a blue-white, and it is \u003cstrong\u003ecrazed right across the face\u003c\/strong\u003e — a dense, even network over the whole surface. The lines have taken up colour over the years, so the crazing now reads as a fine tan web sitting in the glaze rather than as invisible cracks.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eAround the extreme edge runs a band of \u003cstrong\u003eblue sponging\u003c\/strong\u003e: mottled and soft-edged, heavy in some passages and open in others, laid right out to the edge and stopped.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe base is \u003cstrong\u003eunglazed\u003c\/strong\u003e — dry cream clay, aged and stained — and it carries a small \u003cstrong\u003ehand-painted green double tick\u003c\/strong\u003e. There is no printed mark of any kind.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003eHistory \u0026amp; Provenance\u003c\/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eSponge decoration existed to put hand-decorated pottery within reach of ordinary households.\u003c\/strong\u003e A painter dressing a plate took minutes; a decorator with a sponge took seconds. That difference is the entire reason the ware exists, and it is why sponged pottery went out of Britain, France, Holland, Scotland, Wales and Germany by the shipload — exported to China, Africa, North and South America through the middle of the nineteenth century, and made in the United States after 1850 at potteries in New Jersey and East Liverpool, Ohio.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eThe archaeological record separates the techniques, and it matters here.\u003c\/strong\u003e Free-hand sponging runs roughly \u003cstrong\u003e1820s–1860s\u003c\/strong\u003e. Cut sponge — where a sponge is trimmed to a star, a diamond or a flower and stamped in repeat — comes in from about \u003cstrong\u003e1845\u003c\/strong\u003e and peaks through the 1870s. \u003cstrong\u003eOpen sponge, larger and more spaced, with colour smudging and layering rather than repeating, runs 1860–1935.\u003c\/strong\u003e This plate is open sponge: there is no stamped shape anywhere in the band and no motif that repeats.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eThe raw base is a date in itself.\u003c\/strong\u003e A plate that comes out of the kiln with a bare, unglazed underside was fired standing on its own foot, directly on the shelf. Ware glazed all the way under has been fired on stilts or had a ring wiped clear before firing — the later, more industrial method. This one stood on the shelf.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eThe green tick is a decorator's tally, not a maker's mark.\u003c\/strong\u003e Painted marks of that kind were a workshop's own bookkeeping — which hand did the piece, which batch it belonged to, which pile it went on — applied in the decorating shop rather than printed by the pottery. It tells you the plate came out of a working decorating room, and it tells you nobody expected the underside to be read by a customer.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eWhat is absent is as informative as what is present.\u003c\/strong\u003e There is no printed backstamp and no country-of-origin mark anywhere on this plate. Printed marks naming a country became the rule for ware crossing into English-speaking markets from 1891, and the fuller “Made in — ” wording became standard in the 1920s. A plate carrying nothing but a painted tally sits outside that marked export system.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eOffered \u003cstrong\u003eunattributed\u003c\/strong\u003e. Dated on the open-sponge technique, the plain unmoulded rim, the unglazed base, the painted decorator's tally in place of any printed mark, and the depth to which the crazing has opened and taken up colour: \u003cstrong\u003ec. 1880–1905\u003c\/strong\u003e.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003eProduct Details\u003c\/h3\u003e\n\u003ctable border=\"1\" cellpadding=\"8\" cellspacing=\"0\" style=\"width:100%; border-collapse:collapse;\"\u003e\n  \u003cthead\u003e\u003ctr\u003e\n\u003cth align=\"left\" style=\"text-align:left; vertical-align:top;\"\u003eField\u003c\/th\u003e\n\u003cth align=\"left\" style=\"text-align:left; vertical-align:top;\"\u003eDetail\u003c\/th\u003e\n\u003c\/tr\u003e\u003c\/thead\u003e\n  \u003ctbody\u003e\n    \u003ctr\u003e\n\u003ctd style=\"vertical-align:top;\"\u003eObject\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003ctd style=\"vertical-align:top;\"\u003eLarge sponge-decorated earthenware plate, sold as a decorative and display piece rather than as tableware. Approx. 10¾ in across.\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003c\/tr\u003e\n    \u003ctr\u003e\n\u003ctd style=\"vertical-align:top;\"\u003eForm\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003ctd style=\"vertical-align:top;\"\u003eWide flat well with a plain rim turning up in one unbroken curve; no moulded, scalloped or relief edge; unglazed underside\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003c\/tr\u003e\n    \u003ctr\u003e\n\u003ctd style=\"vertical-align:top;\"\u003eDecoration\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003ctd style=\"vertical-align:top;\"\u003eA band of open-sponge blue laid round the extreme rim edge — mottled and soft-edged, with no repeating motif and no stamped shape — over a warm cream glaze\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003c\/tr\u003e\n    \u003ctr\u003e\n\u003ctd style=\"vertical-align:top;\"\u003eMaterial\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003ctd style=\"vertical-align:top;\"\u003eCream-bodied refined earthenware, glazed to the face and rim, base left raw\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003c\/tr\u003e\n    \u003ctr\u003e\n\u003ctd style=\"vertical-align:top;\"\u003eMarks\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003ctd style=\"vertical-align:top;\"\u003eNo maker's mark, printed backstamp or country-of-origin stamp. A small hand-painted green double tick to the unglazed base — a decorating-shop tally. Offered unattributed.\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003c\/tr\u003e\n    \u003ctr\u003e\n\u003ctd style=\"vertical-align:top;\"\u003eEra\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003ctd style=\"vertical-align:top;\"\u003ec. 1880–1905. Dated on the open-sponge technique (in commercial use 1860–1935), the unglazed base of a plate fired on its own foot, the painted tally in place of any printed or country mark, and the aged and stained state of the crazing.\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003c\/tr\u003e\n    \u003ctr\u003e\n\u003ctd style=\"vertical-align:top;\"\u003eCondition\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003ctd style=\"vertical-align:top;\"\u003eVery good for its age, sold as a decorative antique. The plate is sound and sits flat, with no chips to the rim, no cracks, no repairs and no restoration. \u003cstrong\u003eThe glaze is crazed across the whole face and the crazing has stained to a fine tan web\u003c\/strong\u003e — that is age in an antique glaze, not damage, and it is a large part of why the plate reads as old. Expect light utensil marking in the well and age staining and soiling to the raw underside. Condition Guaranteed.\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003c\/tr\u003e\n    \u003ctr\u003e\n\u003ctd style=\"vertical-align:top;\"\u003eAvailability\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003ctd style=\"vertical-align:top;\"\u003eOne of a Kind — 1 Available\u003c\/td\u003e\n\u003c\/tr\u003e\n  \u003c\/tbody\u003e\n\u003c\/table\u003e\n\u003ch3\u003eWhy It Belongs in Your Home\u003c\/h3\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eBlue on cream is the oldest reliable colour scheme in domestic pottery, and this plate is about as distilled a version of it as exists.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eEverything is at the edge. The centre is left completely empty, so the eye goes to the rim, comes back to the middle and finds nothing there but warm cream and the fine web of crazing. That emptiness is why a plate like this hangs well — it does not compete with anything around it, and it reads from across a room as a shape and a colour rather than as a picture.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eHang it alone over a door, or put it in a group where it will be the quiet one among patterned plates. Stand it on a dresser or a plate rail. Lay it under a lamp, a stack of books, a bowl of fruit, a pitcher of branches. It is a good tray for a decanter and two glasses, and a very good place to drop keys and post inside a front door.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe crazing is the thing most people end up liking best. It took a hundred years to arrive at that colour and no process produces it quickly; a crackle put on deliberately looks like a decision, and this looks like time.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eA note on care, and the first point is the important one. \u003cstrong\u003eThis plate should not be used for food.\u003c\/strong\u003e A crazed glaze is an open network of fine cracks that holds moisture and bacteria no washing will reach, and glazes of this period can contain lead. Display, dry use and decorative service only — and if you do lay something on it, put paper or a liner between.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eDo not soak it and never put it in a dishwasher.\u003c\/strong\u003e Water travels into the crazing and into the unglazed base and takes a very long time to come out; it also carries staining in with it, which is how a lightly crazed plate becomes a heavily stained one. Wipe with a barely damp cloth and dry it at once.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eHang it with a coated spring-wire plate hanger rather than an adhesive disc, which can pull glaze off an antique plate when it is removed, and keep it out of direct sunlight, which will take the blue down over time.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Viridian Eclection","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":48046683586665,"sku":"VE-0724","price":190.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0651\/0093\/9369\/files\/5CE602ED-DD19-407B-8294-30A1A2692022.jpg?v=1789258989","url":"https:\/\/viridianeclection.com\/products\/open-sponge-blue-rim-plate-in-cream-earthenware-deeply-aged-crazing-unglazed-base-with-a-painted-decorators-tally-c-1880-1905","provider":"Viridian Eclection","version":"1.0","type":"link"}