Spode Creamware Plate, Brown Tumbledown Dick Patt. 3716, Regency ca 1824

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Spode Creamware Plate, Brown Tumbledown Dick Patt. 3716, Regency ca 1824

About the Item

This is a beautiful Spode plate made around 1824. The plate is made of creamware and is decorated with the famous "Tumbledown Dick" pattern on a brown cracked ice ground. I have a series of Spode chinoiserie plates available, please see my other listings! Spode was the great Pioneer among the Georgian potters in England. Around the year 1800 he perfected the bone china recipe that has been used by British potters ever since, and he was also the leading potter behind the technique of transferware, making it possible for English potters to replace the Chinese export china, which had come to an end around that time, with their own designs. This was fundamental to a thriving industry that would last for about 150 years and provide half the world with their tableware. Spode porcelain is regarded as one of the highest quality porcelains around; for a soft-paste porcelain it is surprisingly hard and Fine, and has a wonderful bright white colour. Blue on white decorations were done in East Asia for many centuries, and were made popular in the West by the Dutch Delftware potters in the 17th Century. In about 1800, Spode created a transfer printing process that could mass produce beautifully decorated blue and white wares, making this a very common and desired choice of tableware for the two centuries to come. Potters all-over Britain quickly started to make use of this new technology and copied the famous Spode patterns. Once the blue on white transfers had caught on, Spode started to print in colour; mostly printing in one colour (in this case: grey) and then filling in the other colours by hand. This way, they could offer wonderfully colourful dinner services at a much lower cost, as they needed only a skilled engraver for the plate that provided the outline of the image, and the transferring and colouring could be done by less skilled people. These were often women and apprenticed teenage children. The Tumbledown Dick pattern was first recorded in about 1820 with pattern number 2987, and then was done in many different colour combinations. This pattern is number 3716 from about 1824. The pattern is an imitation of an original Chinese design from the Yongzheng period (1723-1735). There are various theories about how this pattern got its name; most probably it is a play on a Simple Simon nursery rhyme. These rhymes have been around since Elizabethan times, first recorded in 1685, but were brought out as a children's book in modern English in 1764, which would have been relatively recent in the year 1824. In it, Simple Simon is (unsuccessfully) going to hunt a "dickie-bird", which is a small bird such as a tit, tumbling through the trees. On this plate, you can see the bird hanging by the stem of some wonderful peony flowers. The ground of the plate is in the "cracked ice" pattern, which is also an imitation of an original Chinese design from the same era. The cracked ice pattern and the outline of the flower and bird design were first printed in blue by paper transfer, after which cracked ice transfer was applied in brown, giving the illusion of a brown ground. Then the flow blue, orange, red and purple colours were hand enameled, after which the plate was glazed and finally gilded. As the enamel was applied under the glaze, these plates have less wear than usual. This was a more complicated process than most transfer printed and hand coloured designs, so the Tumbledown Dick dinner and dessert services must have been labour intensive and expensive. The plate carries an imprinted Spode mark and an imprinted number 3, which was probably the workman's number. CONDITION REPORT The plate is in very good antique condition without any damage or repairs and no significant wear. As is usual for creamware plates, it has Fine crazing throughout. Antique British china is never perfect. Kilns were fired on coal in the 1800s, and this meant that china from that period can have some firing specks from flying particles. British makers were also known for their experimentation, and sometimes this resulted in technically imperfect results. Due to the shrinkage in the kiln, items can have small firing lines or develop crazing over time, which should not be seen as damage but as an imperfection of the maker's recipes, probably unknown at the time of making. Items have often been used for many years and can have normal signs of wear, and gilt can have signs of slight disintegration even if never handled. I will reflect any damage, repairs, obvious stress marks, crazing or heavy wear in the item description but some minor scratches, nicks, stains and gilt disintegration can be normal for vintage items and need to be taken into account. There is widespread confusion on the internet about the difference between chips and nicks, or hairlines and cracks. I will reflect any damage as truthfully as I can, i.e. a nick is a tiny bit of damage smaller than 1mm and a chip is something you can easily see with the eye; a glazing line is a break in the glazing only; hairline is extremely tight and/or superficial and not picked up by the finger; and a crack is obvious both to the eye and the finger. Etcetera - I try to be as accurate as I can and please feel free to ask questions or request more detailed pictures! DIMENSIONS 21.3cm (8.4") diameter.

Creator:
Josiah Spode (Maker)
Dimensions:
Height: 0.5 in (1.27 cm)Diameter: 8.4 in (21.34 cm)
Style:
Regency (Of the Period)
Materials and Techniques:
Creamware,Hand-Painted
Place of Origin:
England
Period:
1820-1829
Date of Manufacture:
circa 1824
Condition:
Wear consistent with age and use. Excellent condition without damage, wear or repairs; light crazing throughout but perfect colours.
Seller Location:
London, GB
Reference Number:
Seller: A-SPO561stDibs: LU4805119277782