A Dreamy Creamy Find

The hand-painted central decoration on my newly acquired creamware plates

Photo: Chronica Domus

While it may appear that my cupboards are groaning in protestation from all the English and French ceramics I stuff into them, I am supremely conscious of two painful truths.

1. I am a hopeless addict collector. I know the next time a little pretty catches my eye, something I "must have", I will find a way to bring it home, come hell or high water. Yes, I really am that feeble predictable.  
2. I have run out of storage space which makes my addiction obsession collecting habit a bit of a sticky wicket. 

As I reluctantly came to terms with this piteous state of affairs recently, the inevitable came rapping at my door.  Yes, you guessed it, I (once again) found myself answering that all too familiar siren call.  I had succumbed to the delights of a dreamy creamy find; a stack of creamware dinner plates demanding my attention.  What else could I have done?  I did already tell you I am hopeless.

I have long admired early English creamware, those creamy-colored table articles made of earthenware so popular during the mid-eighteenth and early-nineteenth centuries. Many Staffordshire potteries produced creamware but it was the Wedgwood factory that catapulted its success within the higher echelons of society.  Josiah Wedgwood named his creamware "Queen's Ware" after an extensive tea service was commissioned by his royal patroness Queen Charlotte.   I have resisted creamware's temptations, not wanting to "go there" due in large part to a lack of storage space. Besides, the world is not exactly flush with early creamware. Assembling a sufficient number of plates and serving pieces for a small dinner party would take years if one were fortunate enough to encounter such things on one's travels. Needless to say, more than a fist full of dollars is also a requirement.

This covetable Wedgwood creamware part dinner service circa 1790 sold at Christie's in London in 2008 for a staggering $17,719 or  £11,250

Source

Which is why when I happened upon a stack of six filthy newspaper-wrapped late-eighteenth century creamware dinner plates at the Alameda Point Antiques Faire last month, I hesitated for barely a nanosecond before snapping them up. It helped that the seller looked as if she was in the midst of happily unburdening herself with the entire contents of a small antiques shop she had inherited. Many of the people that sell at the monthly fair are not professional dealers, which makes every visit exceedingly interesting.  One never quite knows what one will unearth.  This particular stallholder 

was selling her wares at what I could only describe as ridiculously rock-bottom prices, and cheerfully so.  You see, my purchase of the six plates amounted to an embarrassingly paltry amount; a mere five dollars. Yes, that's right, five dollars!  For those of you blessed with a sharpish mind for arithmetic, you will have already totted up the fact that each plate cost me less than a dollar. I could not believe my good fortune.  At long last the creamware gods had looked favorably upon my addiction collection. Out of pity, no doubt.

I must explain that it was not as though the stallholder was unaware of what she was selling.  Here is what I found on one of the plates.

My creamware plates in their filthy state

Photo: Chronica Domus

Frustratingly, the other label had already been partially torn off, with only the remains of the word "unusual" still visible. What, I wondered, was so "unusual" about these plates?  Was it the finely painted central medallion bearing the monograms of "IL & MGL"?  Who were these people, and why had these plates been commissioned? Was it to mark the occasion of a wedding, perhaps?  I found it rather odd that only four plates were mentioned on the label, yet there were actually six in the pile I purchased.

Washed and clean and ready for the table (notice how shallow the stack is, convenient for those of us that are storage-challenged)

Photo: Chronica Domus

Once clean and dry, I pulled together the three other early pieces of creamware in my collection; two lozenge-shaped Wedgwood serving dishes, and a shell-shaped monogrammed shallow serving bowl. I set the lot on the dining room table.  It pleased me no end to see that they all coordinated rather nicely, unified by their fresh green enamel decoration.

Hooray! The green decoration on my new plates matched that of my existing Wedgwood creamware dishes

Photo: Chronica Domus

The finely painted central motif on this shell-edged creamware dish also possesses bright green (and puce) enamel and a similarly stylized monogram

Photo: Chronica Domus 

I could not wait to set the dining table with my creamware haul.  Of course, the photograph below was taken for the benefit of this blog posting, to illustrate how splendidly the creamware pieces work with the period glassware and silver already in my collection.  I shall set this table again in mid-October for a formal dinner party we are planning on throwing.  Invitations have already been dispatched and with the addition of our dear friends, some good food, the warm glow of candlelight, and our decanters and glasses overflowing, we plan on having a glorious evening, much in the same vein, I imagine, as the plates' original owners might have enjoyed them.

At long last, a tabletop's worth of creamware enough to throw a small dinner party (please excuse the rugless floor - I'm working on it!)

Photo: Chronica Domus

If any of you find yourself in northern California on the first Sunday of each month, come rain or shine, I highly recommend you plan to spend a day trolling the region's largest antiques fair.  Perhaps you too might unearth a treasure for your own collection.

Do you have a tale you wish to share of a long-desired item unearthed for a pittance?