Pair of Antique Mason Ironstone Wine Coolers, circa 1820

This is a very rare, ironstone Two Handled, Ice Pail or Wine Cooler Pot, made by Mason's Patent Ironstone China Company, of Lane Delph, Staffordshire, England, circa 1818. This piece is substantial and heavily potted, weighing about 2.2 Kg un-packed. The pot is circular with 12 vertical sections, sitting on a low foot with an everted rim. The two side handles are strongly potted and this piece is quite suitable for use or display, as an ice bucket, wine bottle cooler or perhaps as a vase or centre piece. The piece is decorated in the Mason's recorded pattern called "Basket of Flowers" which is a vibrant floral pattern, hand polychrome enamelled over a sepia print on a white glaze. This pattern is illustrated on Page 30...

This is a very rare ironstone vase, in the Chinese style, all hand painted in the coloured dragon pattern, made by the Mason's factory in the early 19th century. Both the vase shape and the pattern are very rare. The vase has a bottle shape with a fairly tall neck, having two dolphin head handles, with attached loops. (NOTES ON SHAPE This vase style is a copy of a much earlier Chinese bronze vase shape produced in the Ming, Hongwu period of 1368 - 1398, which had similar decorative animal head side handles with loops. ( See the book Chinese Ceramics by He Li, page 216, published by Thames & Hudson. ). Also On view at The Met Fifth Avenue in Gallery 204; The square handles and rings illustrate the metal origins of the shape of the vase. Similar examples have been excavated in Chinese tombs dating to the fifteenth and sixteenth century, suggesting that the shape was particularly popular at that time.) This vase is beautifully hand decorated in a more complex variant of the Coloured Chinese Dragon pattern, with strong coloured enamels depicting a green dragon on one side and a pink dragon...

Mason's Ironstone Garniture of Three vases, circa 1835 The three hexagonal-shaped vases are painted with polychrome flowers on a mazarine blue ground. The open-work handles, rim ...

Mason's ironstone Japan pattern pair of vases, circa 1830-1840. The vases are decorated in an imari palette with scroll handles highlighted in tu...