This last month has been full of great sporting tournaments: the European football title, the Wimbledon tennis tournament, and of course the Tour de France, an epic cycling race all around France. Earlier this week the cyclists went past the city of Toulouse in the south of France, so I thought it fitting to show our very own Tour de France in porcelain: a set of Coalport plates from 1844 that are attributed to a painter called John Toulouse. Toulouse was a painter at the Coa

It is that time of the month; you can now read my latest column in Homes & Antiques, called "Made in Chelsea". This month I am writing about the first well-organised large porcelain factory in Britain: Chelsea Porcelain, and how an ambitious and talented Walloon immigrant called Nicholas Sprimont shaped the beginnings of British porcelain. One of the things I find fascinating in researching the journey of British porcelain is the rich mix of European and English styles, and a

You may know that I love a good porcelain figure... not the gaudy figures that you can find in a charity shop, but the true masterpieces made in the 18th Century by Bow, Chelsea or Derby. Because there are so many bad imitations around we have been conditioned to discard them as kitsch, but if you look closely at the masterpieces you will see that they are far from kitsch: they have an innocence and strength about them that is moving. And they were made so well, particularly

I wrote about the colour pink a few weeks ago (you can read it here). Then recently I came across a pink conundrum that puzzled everyone I asked: is the hot pink ground colour of porcelain that became so popular in the 19th Century called 'rose pompadour' or 'rose du barry'? First of all, who were Madame de Pompadour and Madame du Barry? Well, in the old days any self-respecting French King would marry purely for political gain, and then keep a maîtresse for love. Mme de Pomp

A while ago you might have seen a wonderful set of plates similar to these, made by Chamberlains in Worcester in about 1815. That set was sold right away as they are so very rare - but I was lucky enough to get a second lot of the same service. So today I am introducing these to you. This set is a bit bigger (12 plates instead of 8) and it has two wonderful oval serving dishes. All plates are deep plates, so I guess this was meant for a wet kind of dessert... trifle? Somethin

What better to do on a muggy summer day than to go on a hike in the countryside? But if you struggle to get out, I know a way to see the most beautiful spots all over the United Kingdom without having to go very far... This very fine dessert service has stunning landscape paintings on each item, made by the famous painter George B. Johnson. The service was made by Royal Worcester in the year 1912. This is a rare piece of artistry; it has a beautifully muted dark blue "powdere

This month you can read my latest column in Homes & Antiques: The Spirit of Invention. I am writing about the very beginnings of porcelain in Britain in the 1740s. Although Britain was a bit late to the game - the continental Europeans had been at it for several decades - they made up for that with a wave of creative invention, tinkering and experimentation. Much of that was driven by immigrants from France and Belgium, who brought the continental porcelain secrets with them.

⁠Here in Britain we were just starting to despair about the notion of different seasons as the spring seemed to have been passed over this year; but just as the first mildly warm days are reaching our shores, I am showing you some very special seasons. These four framed plates were made by Minton in 1882 and the images were painted by the famous painter Antonin Boullemier. The plates are framed in beautiful Italianate Rococo frames, and they make a wonderful quartet. Antonin

⁠As I’ve shown some bold pink designs lately, I thought to share my ruminations on Pink Power with you…⁠ Pink is often thought of as a feminine colour. I love pink, but personally, as a woman, I sometimes feel persecuted by a pink cloud of fluffy cuteness that is by some considered to be the definition of my gender… Did you know that this has not always been the case? In the 18th and 19th Century pink was equally popular among men. In fact pink used to be seen as a colour for

⁠Today I will focus on the first major porcelain factory in Britain: the Chelsea factory in London. The Chelsea factory was founded in the mid 1740s by Nicholas Sprimont, a Huguenot immigrant from Belgium. He was originally a silversmith among many other Huguenot silversmiths who fled or travelled to London from France and Belgium. Sprimont quickly realised that he could make a bigger mark by starting a factory producing something that was still very new in England: porcelain