Porcelain
Encyclopedia
Porcelain is a ceramic
material made by heating raw materials, generally including clay
in the form of kaolin, in a kiln
to temperatures between 1200 °C (2,192 °F) and 1400 °C (2,552 °F). The toughness, strength, and translucence of porcelain arise mainly from the formation of glass
and the mineral mullite
within the fired body at these high temperatures.
Porcelain derives its present name from old Italian
porcellana (cowrie shell) because of its resemblance to the translucent surface of the shell. Porcelain can informally be referred to as "china" in some English-speaking countries, as China
was the birthplace of porcelain making. Properties associated with porcelain include low permeability and elasticity
; considerable strength
, hardness, glassiness, brittleness, white
ness, translucence, and resonance
; and a high resistance to chemical attack and thermal shock
.
For the purposes of trade, the Combined Nomenclature of the European Communities defines porcelain as being "completely vitrified, hard, impermeable (even before glazing), white or artificially coloured, translucent (except when of considerable thickness) and resonant." However, the term porcelain lacks a universal definition and has "been applied in a very unsystematic fashion to substances of diverse kinds which have only certain surface-qualities in common" (Burton 1906).
and porcelain because this depends upon how the terms are defined. A useful working definition of porcelain might include a broad range of ceramic wares, including some that could be classified as a stoneware. Porcelain is used to make household wares, decorative items, and objects of fine art amongst other things.
The composition of porcelain is highly variable, but the clay mineral kaolinite
is a significant component. Other materials can include feldspar
, ball clay
, glass
, bone ash
, steatite, quartz
, petuntse
and alabaster
.
The clays used are often described as being long or short, depending on their plasticity
. Long clays are cohesive (sticky) and have high plasticity; short clays are less cohesive and have lower plasticity. In soil mechanics
, plasticity is determined by measuring the increase in content of water required to change a clay from a solid state bordering on the plastic, to a plastic state bordering on the liquid, though the term is also used less formally to describe the facility with which a clay may be worked. Clays used for porcelain are generally of lower plasticity and are shorter than many other pottery clays. They wet very quickly, meaning that small changes in the content of water can produce large changes in workability. Thus, the range of water content within which these clays can be worked is very narrow and the loss or gain of water during storage and throwing or forming must be carefully controlled to keep the clay from becoming too wet or too dry to manipulate.
Forming: It is described in the articles Pottery and Ceramic forming techniques
.
Glazing: Unlike their lower-fired counterparts, porcelain wares do not need glazing to render them impermeable to liquids and for the most part are glazed for decorative purposes and to make them resistant to dirt and staining. Great detail is given in the glaze
article. Many types of glaze, such as the iron-containing glaze used on the celadon wares of Longquan
, were designed specifically for their striking effects on porcelain.
Decoration: Porcelain wares may be decorated under the glaze using pigments that include cobalt and copper or over the glaze using coloured enamels
. Like many earlier wares, modern porcelains are often bisque
-fired at around 1,000 degrees Celsius
, coated with glaze and then sent for a second glaze
-firing at a temperature of about 1,300 degrees Celsius or greater. Another early method is once-fired where the glaze is applied to the unfired body and the two fired together in a single operation.
Firing: In this process, green (unfired) ceramic wares are heated to high temperatures in a kiln
to permanently set their shapes. Porcelain is fired at a higher temperature than earthenware so that the body can vitrify
and become non-porous.
Porcelain originated in China
. Although proto-porcelain wares exist dating from the Shang Dynasty
(1600–1046 BCE), by the Eastern Han Dynasty
period (196–220) high firing glazed ceramic wares had developed into porcelain. Porcelain manufactured during the Tang Dynasty
(618–906) was exported to the Islamic world, where it was highly prized. Early porcelain of this type includes the tri-color glazed porcelain, or sancai
wares. The exact dividing line between proto-porcelain and porcelain wares is not a clear one to date. Porcelain items in the restrictive sense that we know them today could be found in the Tang Dynasty, and archaeological finds has pushed the dates back to as early as the Han Dynasty
(206 BCE – 220 CE). By the Sui Dynasty
(581–618) and Tang Dynasty (618–907), porcelain had become widely produced.
Eventually, porcelain and the expertise required to create it began to spread into other areas of East Asia. During the Song Dynasty
(960–1279), artistry and production had reached new heights. The manufacture of porcelain became higly organized and the kiln sites, those excavated from this period, could fire as many as 25,000 wares. By the Ming Dynasty
(1368–1644), porcelain art was being exported
to Europe. Some of the most well-known Chinese porcelain art styles arrived in Europe during this era, such as the coveted blue-and-white wares. The Ming Dynasty controlled much of the porcelain trade, which were further expanded to all over Asia, Africa and Europe through the Silk Road
. Later, Portuguese merchants began direct trade over the sea route with the Ming Dynasty
in 1517 and were followed by Dutch merchants in 1598.
Korean and Japanese porcelain also have long histories and distinct artistic traditions.
china became a commonly–used synonym for the Franco-Italian term porcelain. Apart from copying Chinese porclelain in faience
(tin glazed
earthenware
), the soft-paste Medici porcelain
in 16th-century Florence
was the first real European attempt to reproduce it, with little success.
Early 16th century, the Portuguese brought back samples of kaolin clay, which they discovered in China to be essential in the production of porcelain wares, but the Chinese techniques and composition to manufacture porcelain was not yet fully understood. Countless of experiments to produce porcelain had unpredictable results and would meet with failure. In the German state of Saxony, the search concluded with an eventual discovery in 1708 by Ehrenfried Walther von Tschirnhaus
that produced a hard, white, translucent type of porcelain specimen with a combination of ingredients, including kaolin clay and alabaster
, mined from a Saxon mine in Colditz
. It was closely guarded as a trade secret by the Saxon enterpise.
In 1712, many of the elaborate Chinese manufacturing secrets for porcelain were revealed throughout Europe by the French Jesuit father Francois Xavier d'Entrecolles
and soon published in the Lettres édifiantes et curieuses de Chine par des missionnaires jésuites. The secrets of porcelain manufacturing, which d'Entrecolles read about and witnessed in China, were now known and began being used in Europe.
Von Tschirnhaus
and Böttger
were employed by Augustus the Strong and worked at Dresden
and Meissen
in the German state of Saxony. Tschirnhaus had a wide knowledge of European science and had been involved in the European quest to perfect porcelain manufacture when in 1705 Böttger was appointed to assist him in this task. Böttger had originally been trained as a pharmacist; after he turned to alchemical research, it was his claim that he knew the secret of transmuting dross into gold that attracted the attention of Augustus. Imprisoned by Augustus as an incentive to hasten his research, Böttger was obliged to work with other alchemists in the futile search for transmutation and was eventually assigned to assist Tschirnhaus. One of the first results of the collaboration between the two was the development of a red stoneware that resembled the red stoneware of Yixing
.
A workshop note records that the first specimen of hard, white, and vitrified
European porcelain was produced in 1708. At the time, the research was still being supervised by Tschirnhaus; however, he died in October of that year. It was left to Böttger to report to Augustus in March 1709 that he could make porcelain. For this reason, credit for the European discovery of porcelain is traditionally ascribed to him rather than Tschirnhaus.
The Meissen factory
was established in 1710 after the development of a kiln and a glaze suitable for use with Böttger's porcelain, which required firing at temperatures up to 1400 °C (2,552 °F) to achieve translucence. Meissen porcelain was once-fired, or green-fired. It was noted for its great resistance to thermal shock
; a visitor to the factory in Böttger's time reported having seen a white-hot teapot being removed from the kiln and dropped into cold water without damage. Evidence to support this widely disbelieved story was given in the 1980s when the procedure was repeated in an experiment at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology
.
) were called Frittenporzellan in Germany and frita in Spain. In France they were known as pâte tendre and in England as "soft-paste". They appear to have been given this name because they do not easily retain their shape in the wet state, or because they tend to slump in the kiln under high temperature, or because the body and the glaze can be easily scratched.
Experiments at Rouen
produced the earliest soft-paste in France, but the first important French soft-paste porcelain was made at the Saint-Cloud factory before 1702. Soft-paste factories were established with the Chantilly manufactory
in 1730 and at Mennecy
in 1750. The Vincennes porcelain factory was established in 1740, moving to larger premises at Sèvres in 1756. Vincennes soft-paste was whiter and freer of imperfections than any of its French rivals, which put Vincennes/Sèvres porcelain in the leading position in France and throughout the whole of Europe in the second half of the 18th century.
The first soft-paste in England was demonstrated by Thomas Briand to the Royal Society
in 1742 and is believed to have been based on the Saint-Cloud formula. In 1749, Thomas Frye took out a patent
on a porcelain containing bone ash. This was the first bone china
, subsequently perfected by Josiah Spode
.
In the fifteen years after Briand's demonstration, half a dozen factories were founded in England to make soft-paste table-wares and figures:
discovered deposits of kaolin clay in Cornwall
, making a considerable contribution to the development of porcelain and other whiteware ceramics in the United Kingdom. Cookworthy's factory at Plymouth
, established in 1768, used kaolin clay and china stone
to make porcelain with a body composition similar to that of the Chinese porcelains of the early eighteenth century.
Porcelain can be divided into the three main categories: hard-paste, soft-paste, and bone, depending on the composition of the paste, the material used to form the body of a porcelain object.
in the early 18th century; they were formed from a paste composed of kaolin and alabaster
and fired at temperatures up to 1400 °C (2,552 °F) in a wood-fired kiln, producing a porcelain of great hardness, translucency, and strength. Later, the composition of the Meissen hard paste was changed and the alabaster was replaced by feldspar
and quartz
, allowing the pieces to be fired at lower temperatures. Kaolinite, feldspar and quartz (or other forms of silica) continue to provide the basic ingredients for most continental European hard-paste porcelains.
by firing kaolin clay at high temperatures. As these early formulations suffered from high pyroplastic deformation, or slumping in the kiln at raised temperature, they were uneconomic to produce and of low quality. Formulations were later developed based on kaolin clay with quartz, feldspars, nepheline syenite or other feldspathic rocks. These were technically superior and continue in production. Soft-paste porcelains are fired at lower temperatures than hard-paste porcelain, therefore these are in general less hard than hard-paste porcelains.
is now made worldwide. The English had read the letters, which describes in detail the Chinese porcelain manufacture secrets, given by Jesuit missionary Francois Xavier d'Entrecolles
with avidity and it was said that a misunderstanding of the text was responsible for the first attempts to use bone-ash as an ingredient of English porcelain. In China, kaolin clay was sometimes described as forming the bones of the paste, while the flesh was provided by the refined rocks suitable for the porcelain body. For whatever reason, when it was first tried it was found that adding bone-ash to the paste produced a white, strong, translucent soft-paste porcelain. Traditionally English bone china was made from two parts of bone-ash, one part of kaolin clay and one part china stone
(a feldspathic rock), although this has largely been replaced by feldspars from non-UK sources.
, especially in outdoor applications. Examples are: terminals for high voltage cable
s, bushings of power transformers, insulation of high frequency antennas
and many other cases.
Porcelain can be used as a building material
, usually in the form of tile
s or large rectangular panels. Modern porcelain tiles are generally produced to a number of recognised international standards and definitions. Manufacturers are found across the world with Italy being the global leader, producing over 380 million square metres in 2006. Historic examples of rooms decorated entirely in porcelain tiles can be found in several European palaces including ones at Capodimonte
, Naples, the Royal Palace of Madrid
and the nearby Royal Palace of Aranjuez. and the Porcelain Tower of Nanjing
in China. More recent noteworthy examples include The Dakin Building
in Brisbane, California
and the Gulf Building in Houston, Texas which, when constructed in 1929, had a 70 feet (21.3 m) porcelain logo on its exterior. A more detailed description of the history, manufacture and properties of porcelain tiles is given in the article “Porcelain Tile: The Revolution Is Only Beginning.”
Ceramic
A ceramic is an inorganic, nonmetallic solid prepared by the action of heat and subsequent cooling. Ceramic materials may have a crystalline or partly crystalline structure, or may be amorphous...
material made by heating raw materials, generally including clay
Clay
Clay is a general term including many combinations of one or more clay minerals with traces of metal oxides and organic matter. Geologic clay deposits are mostly composed of phyllosilicate minerals containing variable amounts of water trapped in the mineral structure.- Formation :Clay minerals...
in the form of kaolin, in a kiln
Kiln
A kiln is a thermally insulated chamber, or oven, in which a controlled temperature regime is produced. Uses include the hardening, burning or drying of materials...
to temperatures between 1200 °C (2,192 °F) and 1400 °C (2,552 °F). The toughness, strength, and translucence of porcelain arise mainly from the formation of glass
Glass
Glass is an amorphous solid material. Glasses are typically brittle and optically transparent.The most familiar type of glass, used for centuries in windows and drinking vessels, is soda-lime glass, composed of about 75% silica plus Na2O, CaO, and several minor additives...
and the mineral mullite
Mullite
Mullite or porcelainite is a rare silicate mineral of post-clay genesis. It can form two stoichiometric forms 3Al2O32SiO2 or 2Al2O3 SiO2. Unusually, mullite has no charge balancing cations present...
within the fired body at these high temperatures.
Porcelain derives its present name from old Italian
Italian language
Italian is a Romance language spoken mainly in Europe: Italy, Switzerland, San Marino, Vatican City, by minorities in Malta, Monaco, Croatia, Slovenia, France, Libya, Eritrea, and Somalia, and by immigrant communities in the Americas and Australia...
porcellana (cowrie shell) because of its resemblance to the translucent surface of the shell. Porcelain can informally be referred to as "china" in some English-speaking countries, as China
China
Chinese civilization may refer to:* China for more general discussion of the country.* Chinese culture* Greater China, the transnational community of ethnic Chinese.* History of China* Sinosphere, the area historically affected by Chinese culture...
was the birthplace of porcelain making. Properties associated with porcelain include low permeability and elasticity
Elasticity (physics)
In physics, elasticity is the physical property of a material that returns to its original shape after the stress that made it deform or distort is removed. The relative amount of deformation is called the strain....
; considerable strength
Strength of materials
In materials science, the strength of a material is its ability to withstand an applied stress without failure. The applied stress may be tensile, compressive, or shear. Strength of materials is a subject which deals with loads, deformations and the forces acting on a material. A load applied to a...
, hardness, glassiness, brittleness, white
White
White is a color, the perception of which is evoked by light that stimulates all three types of color sensitive cone cells in the human eye in nearly equal amounts and with high brightness compared to the surroundings. A white visual stimulation will be void of hue and grayness.White light can be...
ness, translucence, and resonance
Resonance
In physics, resonance is the tendency of a system to oscillate at a greater amplitude at some frequencies than at others. These are known as the system's resonant frequencies...
; and a high resistance to chemical attack and thermal shock
Thermal shock
Thermal shock is the name given to cracking as a result of rapid temperature change. Glass and ceramic objects are particularly vulnerable to this form of failure, due to their low toughness, low thermal conductivity, and high thermal expansion coefficients...
.
For the purposes of trade, the Combined Nomenclature of the European Communities defines porcelain as being "completely vitrified, hard, impermeable (even before glazing), white or artificially coloured, translucent (except when of considerable thickness) and resonant." However, the term porcelain lacks a universal definition and has "been applied in a very unsystematic fashion to substances of diverse kinds which have only certain surface-qualities in common" (Burton 1906).
Scope, materials and methods
Scope
The most common uses of porcelain are for utilitarian wares and artistic objects. It can be difficult to distinguish between stonewareStoneware
Stoneware is a vitreous or semi-vitreous ceramic ware with a fine texture. Stoneware is made from clay that is then fired in a kiln, whether by an artisan to make homeware, or in an industrial kiln for mass-produced or specialty products...
and porcelain because this depends upon how the terms are defined. A useful working definition of porcelain might include a broad range of ceramic wares, including some that could be classified as a stoneware. Porcelain is used to make household wares, decorative items, and objects of fine art amongst other things.
Materials
Kaolin clay is the primary material from which porcelain is made, even though clay minerals might account for only a small proportion of the whole. The word "paste" is an old term for both the unfired and fired material. A more common terminology these days for the unfired material is "body", for example, when buying materials a potter might order an amount of porcelain body from a vendor.The composition of porcelain is highly variable, but the clay mineral kaolinite
Kaolinite
Kaolinite is a clay mineral, part of the group of industrial minerals, with the chemical composition Al2Si2O54. It is a layered silicate mineral, with one tetrahedral sheet linked through oxygen atoms to one octahedral sheet of alumina octahedra...
is a significant component. Other materials can include feldspar
Feldspar
Feldspars are a group of rock-forming tectosilicate minerals which make up as much as 60% of the Earth's crust....
, ball clay
Ball clay
Ball clays are kaolinitic sedimentary clays, that commonly consist of 20-80% kaolinite, 10-25% mica, 6-65% quartz. Localized seams in the same deposit have variations in composition, including the quantity of the major minerals, accessory minerals and carbonaceous materials such as lignite...
, glass
Glass
Glass is an amorphous solid material. Glasses are typically brittle and optically transparent.The most familiar type of glass, used for centuries in windows and drinking vessels, is soda-lime glass, composed of about 75% silica plus Na2O, CaO, and several minor additives...
, bone ash
Bone ash
Bone ash is the white, powdery ash left from the burning of bones. It is primarily composed of calcium phosphate. It is commonly used in fertilizers, polishing compounds, and in making ceramics...
, steatite, quartz
Quartz
Quartz is the second-most-abundant mineral in the Earth's continental crust, after feldspar. It is made up of a continuous framework of SiO4 silicon–oxygen tetrahedra, with each oxygen being shared between two tetrahedra, giving an overall formula SiO2. There are many different varieties of quartz,...
, petuntse
Petuntse
Petuntse , also spelled petunse, is a historic term for a wide range of micaceous or feldspathic rocks. However, all will have been subject to geological decomposition processes that result in a material which, after processing, is suitable as an ingredient in some ceramic formulations...
and alabaster
Alabaster
Alabaster is a name applied to varieties of two distinct minerals, when used as a material: gypsum and calcite . The former is the alabaster of the present day; generally, the latter is the alabaster of the ancients...
.
The clays used are often described as being long or short, depending on their plasticity
Plasticity (physics)
In physics and materials science, plasticity describes the deformation of a material undergoing non-reversible changes of shape in response to applied forces. For example, a solid piece of metal being bent or pounded into a new shape displays plasticity as permanent changes occur within the...
. Long clays are cohesive (sticky) and have high plasticity; short clays are less cohesive and have lower plasticity. In soil mechanics
Soil mechanics
Soil mechanics is a branch of engineering mechanics that describes the behavior of soils. It differs from fluid mechanics and solid mechanics in the sense that soils consist of a heterogeneous mixture of fluids and particles but soil may also contain organic solids, liquids, and gasses and other...
, plasticity is determined by measuring the increase in content of water required to change a clay from a solid state bordering on the plastic, to a plastic state bordering on the liquid, though the term is also used less formally to describe the facility with which a clay may be worked. Clays used for porcelain are generally of lower plasticity and are shorter than many other pottery clays. They wet very quickly, meaning that small changes in the content of water can produce large changes in workability. Thus, the range of water content within which these clays can be worked is very narrow and the loss or gain of water during storage and throwing or forming must be carefully controlled to keep the clay from becoming too wet or too dry to manipulate.
Methods
The following section provides background information on the methods used to form, decorate, finish, glaze, and fire ceramic wares.Forming: It is described in the articles Pottery and Ceramic forming techniques
Ceramic forming techniques
Ceramic forming techniques are ways of forming ceramic shapes. This can be used to make everyday tableware from teapots, to engineering ceramics such as computer parts. Methods for forming powders of ceramic raw materials into complex shapes are desirable in many areas of technology...
.
Glazing: Unlike their lower-fired counterparts, porcelain wares do not need glazing to render them impermeable to liquids and for the most part are glazed for decorative purposes and to make them resistant to dirt and staining. Great detail is given in the glaze
Ceramic glaze
Glaze is a layer or coating of a vitreous substance which has been fired to fuse to a ceramic object to color, decorate, strengthen or waterproof it.-Use:...
article. Many types of glaze, such as the iron-containing glaze used on the celadon wares of Longquan
Longquan celadon
Longquan celadon refers to Chinese celadon produced in Longguan kilns which were largely located in Lishui prefecture in southwestern Zhejiang Province...
, were designed specifically for their striking effects on porcelain.
Decoration: Porcelain wares may be decorated under the glaze using pigments that include cobalt and copper or over the glaze using coloured enamels
Vitreous enamel
Vitreous enamel, also porcelain enamel in U.S. English, is a material made by fusing powdered glass to a substrate by firing, usually between 750 and 850 °C...
. Like many earlier wares, modern porcelains are often bisque
Bisque (pottery)
Bisque porcelain is unglazed, white ceramic ware Examples include bisque dolls.Bisque also refers to "pottery that has been fired but not yet glazed...
-fired at around 1,000 degrees Celsius
Celsius
Celsius is a scale and unit of measurement for temperature. It is named after the Swedish astronomer Anders Celsius , who developed a similar temperature scale two years before his death...
, coated with glaze and then sent for a second glaze
Ceramic glaze
Glaze is a layer or coating of a vitreous substance which has been fired to fuse to a ceramic object to color, decorate, strengthen or waterproof it.-Use:...
-firing at a temperature of about 1,300 degrees Celsius or greater. Another early method is once-fired where the glaze is applied to the unfired body and the two fired together in a single operation.
Firing: In this process, green (unfired) ceramic wares are heated to high temperatures in a kiln
Kiln
A kiln is a thermally insulated chamber, or oven, in which a controlled temperature regime is produced. Uses include the hardening, burning or drying of materials...
to permanently set their shapes. Porcelain is fired at a higher temperature than earthenware so that the body can vitrify
Vitrification
Vitrification is the transformation of a substance into a glass. Usually, it is achieved by rapidly cooling a liquid through the glass transition. Certain chemical reactions also result in glasses...
and become non-porous.
Chinese porcelain
China
Chinese civilization may refer to:* China for more general discussion of the country.* Chinese culture* Greater China, the transnational community of ethnic Chinese.* History of China* Sinosphere, the area historically affected by Chinese culture...
. Although proto-porcelain wares exist dating from the Shang Dynasty
Shang Dynasty
The Shang Dynasty or Yin Dynasty was, according to traditional sources, the second Chinese dynasty, after the Xia. They ruled in the northeastern regions of the area known as "China proper" in the Yellow River valley...
(1600–1046 BCE), by the Eastern Han Dynasty
Han Dynasty
The Han Dynasty was the second imperial dynasty of China, preceded by the Qin Dynasty and succeeded by the Three Kingdoms . It was founded by the rebel leader Liu Bang, known posthumously as Emperor Gaozu of Han. It was briefly interrupted by the Xin Dynasty of the former regent Wang Mang...
period (196–220) high firing glazed ceramic wares had developed into porcelain. Porcelain manufactured during the Tang Dynasty
Tang Dynasty
The Tang Dynasty was an imperial dynasty of China preceded by the Sui Dynasty and followed by the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms Period. It was founded by the Li family, who seized power during the decline and collapse of the Sui Empire...
(618–906) was exported to the Islamic world, where it was highly prized. Early porcelain of this type includes the tri-color glazed porcelain, or sancai
Sancai
Sancai is a type of ceramics using three intermingled colors for decoration.-Technique:The body of Sancai ceramics was made of white clay, coated with a layer of glaze, and fired at a temperature of 800 degrees Celsius. Sancai is a type of lead-glazed pottery: lead oxide was the principal flux in...
wares. The exact dividing line between proto-porcelain and porcelain wares is not a clear one to date. Porcelain items in the restrictive sense that we know them today could be found in the Tang Dynasty, and archaeological finds has pushed the dates back to as early as the Han Dynasty
Han Dynasty
The Han Dynasty was the second imperial dynasty of China, preceded by the Qin Dynasty and succeeded by the Three Kingdoms . It was founded by the rebel leader Liu Bang, known posthumously as Emperor Gaozu of Han. It was briefly interrupted by the Xin Dynasty of the former regent Wang Mang...
(206 BCE – 220 CE). By the Sui Dynasty
Sui Dynasty
The Sui Dynasty was a powerful, but short-lived Imperial Chinese dynasty. Preceded by the Southern and Northern Dynasties, it ended nearly four centuries of division between rival regimes. It was followed by the Tang Dynasty....
(581–618) and Tang Dynasty (618–907), porcelain had become widely produced.
Eventually, porcelain and the expertise required to create it began to spread into other areas of East Asia. During the Song Dynasty
Song Dynasty
The Song Dynasty was a ruling dynasty in China between 960 and 1279; it succeeded the Five Dynasties and Ten Kingdoms Period, and was followed by the Yuan Dynasty. It was the first government in world history to issue banknotes or paper money, and the first Chinese government to establish a...
(960–1279), artistry and production had reached new heights. The manufacture of porcelain became higly organized and the kiln sites, those excavated from this period, could fire as many as 25,000 wares. By the Ming Dynasty
Ming Dynasty
The Ming Dynasty, also Empire of the Great Ming, was the ruling dynasty of China from 1368 to 1644, following the collapse of the Mongol-led Yuan Dynasty. The Ming, "one of the greatest eras of orderly government and social stability in human history", was the last dynasty in China ruled by ethnic...
(1368–1644), porcelain art was being exported
Chinese export porcelain
Chinese export porcelain concerns a wide range of porcelain that was made and decorated in China exclusively for export to Europe and later to North America between the 16th and the 20th century.-Early China porcelain trade:...
to Europe. Some of the most well-known Chinese porcelain art styles arrived in Europe during this era, such as the coveted blue-and-white wares. The Ming Dynasty controlled much of the porcelain trade, which were further expanded to all over Asia, Africa and Europe through the Silk Road
Silk Road
The Silk Road or Silk Route refers to a historical network of interlinking trade routes across the Afro-Eurasian landmass that connected East, South, and Western Asia with the Mediterranean and European world, as well as parts of North and East Africa...
. Later, Portuguese merchants began direct trade over the sea route with the Ming Dynasty
Ming Dynasty
The Ming Dynasty, also Empire of the Great Ming, was the ruling dynasty of China from 1368 to 1644, following the collapse of the Mongol-led Yuan Dynasty. The Ming, "one of the greatest eras of orderly government and social stability in human history", was the last dynasty in China ruled by ethnic...
in 1517 and were followed by Dutch merchants in 1598.
Korean and Japanese porcelain also have long histories and distinct artistic traditions.
European porcelain
These exported Chinese porcelains were held in such great esteem in Europe that in the English languageEnglish language
English is a West Germanic language that arose in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and spread into what was to become south-east Scotland under the influence of the Anglian medieval kingdom of Northumbria...
china became a commonly–used synonym for the Franco-Italian term porcelain. Apart from copying Chinese porclelain in faience
Faience
Faience or faïence is the conventional name in English for fine tin-glazed pottery on a delicate pale buff earthenware body, originally associated with Faenza in northern Italy. The invention of a white pottery glaze suitable for painted decoration, by the addition of an oxide of tin to the slip...
(tin glazed
Tin-glazed pottery
Tin-glazed pottery is a majolica pottery covered in glaze containing tin oxide which is white, shiny and opaque. The pottery body is usually made of red or buff colored earthenware and the white glaze was often used to imitate Chinese porcelain...
earthenware
Earthenware
Earthenware is a common ceramic material, which is used extensively for pottery tableware and decorative objects.-Types of earthenware:Although body formulations vary between countries and even between individual makers, a generic composition is 25% ball clay, 28% kaolin, 32% quartz, and 15%...
), the soft-paste Medici porcelain
Medici porcelain
Medici porcelain was the first successful attempt in Europe to make imitations of Chinese porcelain, although it didn't managed to make true porcelain. The experimental manufactory housed in the Casino of San Marco in Florence existed between 1575 and 1587 under the patronage of Francesco I de'...
in 16th-century Florence
Florence
Florence is the capital city of the Italian region of Tuscany and of the province of Florence. It is the most populous city in Tuscany, with approximately 370,000 inhabitants, expanding to over 1.5 million in the metropolitan area....
was the first real European attempt to reproduce it, with little success.
Early 16th century, the Portuguese brought back samples of kaolin clay, which they discovered in China to be essential in the production of porcelain wares, but the Chinese techniques and composition to manufacture porcelain was not yet fully understood. Countless of experiments to produce porcelain had unpredictable results and would meet with failure. In the German state of Saxony, the search concluded with an eventual discovery in 1708 by Ehrenfried Walther von Tschirnhaus
Ehrenfried Walther von Tschirnhaus
Ehrenfried Walther von Tschirnhaus was a German mathematician, physicist, physician, and philosopher...
that produced a hard, white, translucent type of porcelain specimen with a combination of ingredients, including kaolin clay and alabaster
Alabaster
Alabaster is a name applied to varieties of two distinct minerals, when used as a material: gypsum and calcite . The former is the alabaster of the present day; generally, the latter is the alabaster of the ancients...
, mined from a Saxon mine in Colditz
Colditz
Colditz is a town in the Free State of Saxony, Germany, near Leipzig, located on the banks of the river Mulde. The town has a population of 5,188 ....
. It was closely guarded as a trade secret by the Saxon enterpise.
In 1712, many of the elaborate Chinese manufacturing secrets for porcelain were revealed throughout Europe by the French Jesuit father Francois Xavier d'Entrecolles
Francois Xavier d'Entrecolles
Francois Xavier d'Entrecolles was a French Jesuit priest, who discovered the Chinese technique of manufacturing "true" or hard-paste porcelain through his investigations in China at Jingdezhen with the help of Chinese Catholic converts between 1712 and 1722, during the rule of the Kangxi...
and soon published in the Lettres édifiantes et curieuses de Chine par des missionnaires jésuites. The secrets of porcelain manufacturing, which d'Entrecolles read about and witnessed in China, were now known and began being used in Europe.
Meissen
Ehrenfried Walther von Tschirnhaus
Ehrenfried Walther von Tschirnhaus was a German mathematician, physicist, physician, and philosopher...
and Böttger
Johann Friedrich Böttger
Johann Friedrich Böttger was a Germanalchemist.He was generally acknowledged as the inventor of European porcelain although more recent sources ascribe this to Ehrenfried Walther von Tschirnhaus...
were employed by Augustus the Strong and worked at Dresden
Dresden
Dresden is the capital city of the Free State of Saxony in Germany. It is situated in a valley on the River Elbe, near the Czech border. The Dresden conurbation is part of the Saxon Triangle metropolitan area....
and Meissen
Meissen
Meissen is a town of approximately 30,000 about northwest of Dresden on both banks of the Elbe river in the Free State of Saxony, in eastern Germany. Meissen is the home of Meissen porcelain, the Albrechtsburg castle, the Gothic Meissen Cathedral and the Meissen Frauenkirche...
in the German state of Saxony. Tschirnhaus had a wide knowledge of European science and had been involved in the European quest to perfect porcelain manufacture when in 1705 Böttger was appointed to assist him in this task. Böttger had originally been trained as a pharmacist; after he turned to alchemical research, it was his claim that he knew the secret of transmuting dross into gold that attracted the attention of Augustus. Imprisoned by Augustus as an incentive to hasten his research, Böttger was obliged to work with other alchemists in the futile search for transmutation and was eventually assigned to assist Tschirnhaus. One of the first results of the collaboration between the two was the development of a red stoneware that resembled the red stoneware of Yixing
Yixing clay
Yixing clay is a type of clay from the region near the city of Yixing in Jiangsu province, China. Its use dates back to the Song Dynasty when purple clay was first mined around Lake Taihu in China. From the 17th century on, the ware was commonly exported to Europe. The finished stoneware, which...
.
A workshop note records that the first specimen of hard, white, and vitrified
Vitrification
Vitrification is the transformation of a substance into a glass. Usually, it is achieved by rapidly cooling a liquid through the glass transition. Certain chemical reactions also result in glasses...
European porcelain was produced in 1708. At the time, the research was still being supervised by Tschirnhaus; however, he died in October of that year. It was left to Böttger to report to Augustus in March 1709 that he could make porcelain. For this reason, credit for the European discovery of porcelain is traditionally ascribed to him rather than Tschirnhaus.
The Meissen factory
Meissen porcelain
Meissen porcelain or Meissen china is the first European hard-paste porcelain that was developed from 1708 by Ehrenfried Walther von Tschirnhaus. After his death that October, Johann Friedrich Böttger, continued his work and brought porcelain to the market...
was established in 1710 after the development of a kiln and a glaze suitable for use with Böttger's porcelain, which required firing at temperatures up to 1400 °C (2,552 °F) to achieve translucence. Meissen porcelain was once-fired, or green-fired. It was noted for its great resistance to thermal shock
Thermal shock
Thermal shock is the name given to cracking as a result of rapid temperature change. Glass and ceramic objects are particularly vulnerable to this form of failure, due to their low toughness, low thermal conductivity, and high thermal expansion coefficients...
; a visitor to the factory in Böttger's time reported having seen a white-hot teapot being removed from the kiln and dropped into cold water without damage. Evidence to support this widely disbelieved story was given in the 1980s when the procedure was repeated in an experiment at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
The Massachusetts Institute of Technology is a private research university located in Cambridge, Massachusetts. MIT has five schools and one college, containing a total of 32 academic departments, with a strong emphasis on scientific and technological education and research.Founded in 1861 in...
.
Soft paste porcelain
The pastes produced by combining clay and powdered glass (fritFrit
Frit is a ceramic composition that has been fused in a special fusing oven, quenched to form a glass, and granulated. Frits form an important part of the batches used in compounding enamels and ceramic glazes; the purpose of this pre-fusion is to render any soluble and/or toxic components insoluble...
) were called Frittenporzellan in Germany and frita in Spain. In France they were known as pâte tendre and in England as "soft-paste". They appear to have been given this name because they do not easily retain their shape in the wet state, or because they tend to slump in the kiln under high temperature, or because the body and the glaze can be easily scratched.
Experiments at Rouen
Rouen
Rouen , in northern France on the River Seine, is the capital of the Haute-Normandie region and the historic capital city of Normandy. Once one of the largest and most prosperous cities of medieval Europe , it was the seat of the Exchequer of Normandy in the Middle Ages...
produced the earliest soft-paste in France, but the first important French soft-paste porcelain was made at the Saint-Cloud factory before 1702. Soft-paste factories were established with the Chantilly manufactory
Chantilly porcelain
Chantilly porcelain is French soft-paste porcelain produced between 1730 and 1800 by the manufactory of Chantilly in Oise, France.-Foundation:...
in 1730 and at Mennecy
Mennecy
Mennecy is a commune in the Essonne department in Île-de-France in northern France.Inhabitants of Mennecy are known as Menneçois.-Twin towns:...
in 1750. The Vincennes porcelain factory was established in 1740, moving to larger premises at Sèvres in 1756. Vincennes soft-paste was whiter and freer of imperfections than any of its French rivals, which put Vincennes/Sèvres porcelain in the leading position in France and throughout the whole of Europe in the second half of the 18th century.
The first soft-paste in England was demonstrated by Thomas Briand to the Royal Society
Royal Society
The Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge, known simply as the Royal Society, is a learned society for science, and is possibly the oldest such society in existence. Founded in November 1660, it was granted a Royal Charter by King Charles II as the "Royal Society of London"...
in 1742 and is believed to have been based on the Saint-Cloud formula. In 1749, Thomas Frye took out a patent
Patent
A patent is a form of intellectual property. It consists of a set of exclusive rights granted by a sovereign state to an inventor or their assignee for a limited period of time in exchange for the public disclosure of an invention....
on a porcelain containing bone ash. This was the first bone china
Bone china
Bone china is a type of soft-paste porcelain that is composed of bone ash, feldspathic material and kaolin. It has been defined as ware with a translucent body containing a minimum of 30% of phosphate derived from animal bone and calculated calcium phosphate...
, subsequently perfected by Josiah Spode
Josiah Spode
Josiah Spode was an English potter and the founder of the English Spode pottery works which became very famous for the quality of its wares. He is often credited with the establishment of blue underglaze transfer printing in Staffordshire in 1781–84, and with the definition and introduction in c...
.
In the fifteen years after Briand's demonstration, half a dozen factories were founded in England to make soft-paste table-wares and figures:
- ChelseaChelsea porcelain factoryThe Chelsea porcelain manufactory is the first important porcelain manufactory in England; its earliest soft-paste porcelain, aimed at the aristocratic market—cream jugs in the form of two seated goats—are dated 1745...
(1743) - BowBow porcelain factoryThe Bow porcelain factory was an emulative rival of the Chelsea porcelain factory in the manufacture of early soft-paste porcelain in Great Britain...
(1745) - St James's (1748)
- Bristol porcelain (1748)
- Longton Hall (1750)
- DerbyRoyal Crown DerbyThe Royal Crown Derby Porcelain Company is a porcelain manufacturer, based in Derby, England. The company, particularly known for its high-quality bone china, has produced tableware and ornamental items since approximately 1750...
(1757) - Lowestoft porcelain (1757)
Other developments
William CookworthyWilliam Cookworthy
-Bibliography:*Early New Church Worthies by the Rev Dr Jonathon Bayley*Cookworthy's Plymouth and Bristol Porcelain by F.Severne Mackenna published by F.Lewis...
discovered deposits of kaolin clay in Cornwall
Cornwall
Cornwall is a unitary authority and ceremonial county of England, within the United Kingdom. It is bordered to the north and west by the Celtic Sea, to the south by the English Channel, and to the east by the county of Devon, over the River Tamar. Cornwall has a population of , and covers an area of...
, making a considerable contribution to the development of porcelain and other whiteware ceramics in the United Kingdom. Cookworthy's factory at Plymouth
Plymouth Porcelain
Plymouth porcelain was a hard paste porcelain made in the English county of Devon in the 18th century .The porcelain factories at Plymouth and Bristol are noteworthy because they were amongst the earliest English manufacturers of porcelain...
, established in 1768, used kaolin clay and china stone
China stone
China stone is a medium grained, feldspar-rich partially decomposed granite characterized by the absence of iron-bearing minerals. Its mineral content includes quartz, feldspar and mica; accessory minerals include kaolinite and fluorspar...
to make porcelain with a body composition similar to that of the Chinese porcelains of the early eighteenth century.
Categories of porcelain
Hard paste
These porcelain that came from East Asia, especially China, were some of the finest quality porcelain wares. Hard-paste porcelain can sometimes be called "true porcelain", although this is an outdated term which is not recognised by any authority. The earliest European porcelains were produced at the Meissen factoryMeissen porcelain
Meissen porcelain or Meissen china is the first European hard-paste porcelain that was developed from 1708 by Ehrenfried Walther von Tschirnhaus. After his death that October, Johann Friedrich Böttger, continued his work and brought porcelain to the market...
in the early 18th century; they were formed from a paste composed of kaolin and alabaster
Alabaster
Alabaster is a name applied to varieties of two distinct minerals, when used as a material: gypsum and calcite . The former is the alabaster of the present day; generally, the latter is the alabaster of the ancients...
and fired at temperatures up to 1400 °C (2,552 °F) in a wood-fired kiln, producing a porcelain of great hardness, translucency, and strength. Later, the composition of the Meissen hard paste was changed and the alabaster was replaced by feldspar
Feldspar
Feldspars are a group of rock-forming tectosilicate minerals which make up as much as 60% of the Earth's crust....
and quartz
Quartz
Quartz is the second-most-abundant mineral in the Earth's continental crust, after feldspar. It is made up of a continuous framework of SiO4 silicon–oxygen tetrahedra, with each oxygen being shared between two tetrahedra, giving an overall formula SiO2. There are many different varieties of quartz,...
, allowing the pieces to be fired at lower temperatures. Kaolinite, feldspar and quartz (or other forms of silica) continue to provide the basic ingredients for most continental European hard-paste porcelains.
Soft paste
Soft-paste porcelains date back from the early attempts by European potters to replicate Chinese porcelain by using mixtures of clay and ground-up glass (frit) to produce soft-paste porcelain or, as these can be called, "artificial porcelains". Soapstone and lime were known to have been included in these compositions. These wares were not yet actual porcelain wares as they were not hard and vitrifiedVitrification
Vitrification is the transformation of a substance into a glass. Usually, it is achieved by rapidly cooling a liquid through the glass transition. Certain chemical reactions also result in glasses...
by firing kaolin clay at high temperatures. As these early formulations suffered from high pyroplastic deformation, or slumping in the kiln at raised temperature, they were uneconomic to produce and of low quality. Formulations were later developed based on kaolin clay with quartz, feldspars, nepheline syenite or other feldspathic rocks. These were technically superior and continue in production. Soft-paste porcelains are fired at lower temperatures than hard-paste porcelain, therefore these are in general less hard than hard-paste porcelains.
Bone
Although originally developed in England since 1748 to compete with imported porcelain, bone chinaBone china
Bone china is a type of soft-paste porcelain that is composed of bone ash, feldspathic material and kaolin. It has been defined as ware with a translucent body containing a minimum of 30% of phosphate derived from animal bone and calculated calcium phosphate...
is now made worldwide. The English had read the letters, which describes in detail the Chinese porcelain manufacture secrets, given by Jesuit missionary Francois Xavier d'Entrecolles
Francois Xavier d'Entrecolles
Francois Xavier d'Entrecolles was a French Jesuit priest, who discovered the Chinese technique of manufacturing "true" or hard-paste porcelain through his investigations in China at Jingdezhen with the help of Chinese Catholic converts between 1712 and 1722, during the rule of the Kangxi...
with avidity and it was said that a misunderstanding of the text was responsible for the first attempts to use bone-ash as an ingredient of English porcelain. In China, kaolin clay was sometimes described as forming the bones of the paste, while the flesh was provided by the refined rocks suitable for the porcelain body. For whatever reason, when it was first tried it was found that adding bone-ash to the paste produced a white, strong, translucent soft-paste porcelain. Traditionally English bone china was made from two parts of bone-ash, one part of kaolin clay and one part china stone
China stone
China stone is a medium grained, feldspar-rich partially decomposed granite characterized by the absence of iron-bearing minerals. Its mineral content includes quartz, feldspar and mica; accessory minerals include kaolinite and fluorspar...
(a feldspathic rock), although this has largely been replaced by feldspars from non-UK sources.
Electric insulating material
Porcelain is an excellent insulator for use at high voltageHigh voltage
The term high voltage characterizes electrical circuits in which the voltage used is the cause of particular safety concerns and insulation requirements...
, especially in outdoor applications. Examples are: terminals for high voltage cable
High voltage cable
A high voltage cable - also called HV cable - is used for electric power transmission at high voltage. High voltage cables of differing types have a variety of applications in instruments, ignition systems, AC and DC power transmission...
s, bushings of power transformers, insulation of high frequency antennas
Antenna (radio)
An antenna is an electrical device which converts electric currents into radio waves, and vice versa. It is usually used with a radio transmitter or radio receiver...
and many other cases.
Building material
Building material
Building material is any material which is used for a construction purpose. Many naturally occurring substances, such as clay, sand, wood and rocks, even twigs and leaves have been used to construct buildings. Apart from naturally occurring materials, many man-made products are in use, some more...
, usually in the form of tile
Tile
A tile is a manufactured piece of hard-wearing material such as ceramic, stone, metal, or even glass. Tiles are generally used for covering roofs, floors, walls, showers, or other objects such as tabletops...
s or large rectangular panels. Modern porcelain tiles are generally produced to a number of recognised international standards and definitions. Manufacturers are found across the world with Italy being the global leader, producing over 380 million square metres in 2006. Historic examples of rooms decorated entirely in porcelain tiles can be found in several European palaces including ones at Capodimonte
Museo di Capodimonte
The National Museum of Capodimonte is located in the Palace of Capodimonte, a grand Bourbon palazzo in Naples, Italy. The museum is the prime repository of Neapolitan painting and decorative art, with several important works from other Italian schools of painting, and some important Ancient Roman...
, Naples, the Royal Palace of Madrid
Royal Palace of Madrid
The Palacio Real de Madrid is the official residence of the King of Spain in the city of Madrid, but it is only used for state ceremonies. King Juan Carlos and the Royal Family do not reside in the palace, choosing instead the more modest Palacio de la Zarzuela on the outskirts of Madrid...
and the nearby Royal Palace of Aranjuez. and the Porcelain Tower of Nanjing
Porcelain Tower of Nanjing
The Porcelain Tower of Nanjing , also known as Bao'ensi , is a historical site located on the south bank of the Yangtze in Nanjing, China...
in China. More recent noteworthy examples include The Dakin Building
Dakin Building
The Dakin Building is an architectural award-winning class A office building on the San Francisco Bay in Brisbane, California. Serving as a corporate headquarters building for several companies of national prominence, it was built from the profits of the Garfield character whose licensed products...
in Brisbane, California
Brisbane, California
Brisbane is a small city located in the northern part of San Mateo County, California on the lower slopes of San Bruno Mountain. It is on the northeastern edge of South San Francisco, next to the San Francisco Bay and near the San Francisco International Airport.The population was 4,282 as of...
and the Gulf Building in Houston, Texas which, when constructed in 1929, had a 70 feet (21.3 m) porcelain logo on its exterior. A more detailed description of the history, manufacture and properties of porcelain tiles is given in the article “Porcelain Tile: The Revolution Is Only Beginning.”
Manufacturers
- For AustriaAustriaAustria , officially the Republic of Austria , is a landlocked country of roughly 8.4 million people in Central Europe. It is bordered by the Czech Republic and Germany to the north, Slovakia and Hungary to the east, Slovenia and Italy to the south, and Switzerland and Liechtenstein to the...
, DenmarkDenmarkDenmark is a Scandinavian country in Northern Europe. The countries of Denmark and Greenland, as well as the Faroe Islands, constitute the Kingdom of Denmark . It is the southernmost of the Nordic countries, southwest of Sweden and south of Norway, and bordered to the south by Germany. Denmark...
, FinlandFinlandFinland , officially the Republic of Finland, is a Nordic country situated in the Fennoscandian region of Northern Europe. It is bordered by Sweden in the west, Norway in the north and Russia in the east, while Estonia lies to its south across the Gulf of Finland.Around 5.4 million people reside...
, HungaryHungaryHungary , officially the Republic of Hungary , is a landlocked country in Central Europe. It is situated in the Carpathian Basin and is bordered by Slovakia to the north, Ukraine and Romania to the east, Serbia and Croatia to the south, Slovenia to the southwest and Austria to the west. The...
, LithuaniaLithuaniaLithuania , officially the Republic of Lithuania is a country in Northern Europe, the biggest of the three Baltic states. It is situated along the southeastern shore of the Baltic Sea, whereby to the west lie Sweden and Denmark...
, PolandPolandPoland , officially the Republic of Poland , is a country in Central Europe bordered by Germany to the west; the Czech Republic and Slovakia to the south; Ukraine, Belarus and Lithuania to the east; and the Baltic Sea and Kaliningrad Oblast, a Russian exclave, to the north...
, NorwayNorwayNorway , officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic unitary constitutional monarchy whose territory comprises the western portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula, Jan Mayen, and the Arctic archipelago of Svalbard and Bouvet Island. Norway has a total area of and a population of about 4.9 million...
, PolandPolandPoland , officially the Republic of Poland , is a country in Central Europe bordered by Germany to the west; the Czech Republic and Slovakia to the south; Ukraine, Belarus and Lithuania to the east; and the Baltic Sea and Kaliningrad Oblast, a Russian exclave, to the north...
, RomaniaRomaniaRomania is a country located at the crossroads of Central and Southeastern Europe, on the Lower Danube, within and outside the Carpathian arch, bordering on the Black Sea...
, SpainSpainSpain , officially the Kingdom of Spain languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Spain's official name is as follows:;;;;;;), is a country and member state of the European Union located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula...
, and SwitzerlandSwitzerlandSwitzerland name of one of the Swiss cantons. ; ; ; or ), in its full name the Swiss Confederation , is a federal republic consisting of 26 cantons, with Bern as the seat of the federal authorities. The country is situated in Western Europe,Or Central Europe depending on the definition....
see Porcelain manufacturing companies in Europe
- GermanyGermanyGermany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
- Current porcelain manufacturers in Germany
- PortugalPortugalPortugal , officially the Portuguese Republic is a country situated in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula. Portugal is the westernmost country of Europe, and is bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the West and South and by Spain to the North and East. The Atlantic archipelagos of the...
- Vista AlegreVista Alegre (company)Vista Alegre is a Portuguese porcelain manufacturer located in Ílhavo in the district of Aveiro.By May 2001, Grupo Vista Alegre joined with the Atlantis group and created the largest nacional tableware Group and the sixth in the world in this specialty: the Grupo Vista Alegre Atlantis...
- Vista Alegre
- FranceFranceThe French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
- Rouen porcelainRouen manufactoryThe Rouen manufactory was an early French manufactory for faience and soft-paste porcelain, located in Rouen, Normandy.-Soft-paste porcelain :...
, (1673–1696), faienceFaienceFaience or faïence is the conventional name in English for fine tin-glazed pottery on a delicate pale buff earthenware body, originally associated with Faenza in northern Italy. The invention of a white pottery glaze suitable for painted decoration, by the addition of an oxide of tin to the slip... - Nevers porcelainNevers manufactoryThe Nevers manufactory was a French manufacturing center for faience in the city of Nevers. A porcelain manufactury in Nevers was also mentioned in 1844 by Alexandre Brongniart, but little is known about it....
, (1600–1789), faienceFaienceFaience or faïence is the conventional name in English for fine tin-glazed pottery on a delicate pale buff earthenware body, originally associated with Faenza in northern Italy. The invention of a white pottery glaze suitable for painted decoration, by the addition of an oxide of tin to the slip... - Saint-Cloud porcelainSaint-Cloud porcelainSaint-Cloud porcelain was a type of soft-paste porcelain produced in the French town of Saint-Cloud from the late 17th to the mid 18th century.-Foundation:...
, (1693–1766) - Chantilly porcelainChantilly porcelainChantilly porcelain is French soft-paste porcelain produced between 1730 and 1800 by the manufactory of Chantilly in Oise, France.-Foundation:...
, (1730–1800) - Vincennes porcelainVincennes porcelainThe Vincennes porcelain manufactory was established in 1740 in the disused royal Château de Vincennes, in Vincennes, east of Paris, which was from the start the main market for its wares.-History:...
, (1740–1756) - Mennecy-Villeroy porcelainMennecy-Villeroy porcelainMennecy-Villeroy porcelain is a French soft-paste porcelain from the manufactory established under the patronage of Louis-François-Anne de Neufville, duc de Villeroy and — from 1748 — housed in outbuildings in the park of his château de Villeroy, and in the nearby village of Mennecy . The duke's...
, (1745–1765) - Sèvres porcelainManufacture nationale de SèvresThe manufacture nationale de Sèvres is a Frit porcelain porcelain tendre factory at Sèvres, France. Formerly a royal, then an imperial factory, the facility is now run by the Ministry of Culture.-Brief history:...
, (1756–present) - Limoges porcelainLimoges porcelainLimoges porcelain designates hard-paste porcelain produced by factories near the city of Limoges, France beginning in the late 18th century, but does not refer to a particular manufacturer.- History :...
, (1771–present) - Revol porcelainRevol PorcelaineRevol Porcelaine S.A. was founded in 1789 by brothers Joseph-Marie and François Revol in France's Rhone Valley, where they discovered a deposit of white kaolin. They established a factory in Ponsas and began manufacturing a hard-wearing white stoneware, later establishing operations in Saint-Uze...
, (1789–present) - Haviland porcelainHaviland & Co.Haviland & Co. is a manufacturer of Limoges porcelain.-History:David Haviland was an American businessman from New York dealing with porcelain. While seeking out new business interests, he arrived in Limoges, France and by 1842, he was able to send his first shipment of Limoges porcelain to the...
- Rouen porcelain
- JapanJapanJapan is an island nation in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean, it lies to the east of the Sea of Japan, China, North Korea, South Korea and Russia, stretching from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea and Taiwan in the south...
- NoritakeNoritakeis a porcelain maker headquartered in Nagoya, Aichi Prefecture, Japan.- History :Noritake Co., Limited, commonly known as "Noritake," grew out of a trading company established in Tokyo and in New York City by the Morimura Brothers in 1876. In 1904, key members of this trading company created the...
- Noritake
- RussiaRussiaRussia or , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia. It is a federal semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...
- Imperial Porcelain FactoryImperial Porcelain FactoryThe Imperial Porcelain Factory , is a producer of fine, handpainted ceramic products in Saint Petersburg, Russia. It was established by Dmitry Ivanovich Vinogradov in the town of Oranienbaum in 1744...
(1744), OranienbaumOranienbaum, RussiaOranienbaum is a Russian royal residence, located on the Gulf of Finland west of St. Petersburg. The Palace ensemble and the city centre are UNESCO World Heritage Sites.-History:... - Gzhel (ceramics)Gzhel (ceramics)Gzhel is a style of ceramics which takes its name from the village of Gzhel and surrounding area, where it has been produced since 1802.-Overview:...
(1802), Gzhel (village)Gzhel (village)Gzhel is the name of two rural localities in Ramensky District, Moscow Oblast, Russia, southeast from the center of Moscow. It gave its name to Gzhel ceramics as well as the Gzhelian age and stage in the ICS geologic timescale. In a broader sense, the name also refers to a cluster of villages and...
- Imperial Porcelain Factory
- TurkeyTurkeyTurkey , known officially as the Republic of Turkey , is a Eurasian country located in Western Asia and in East Thrace in Southeastern Europe...
- Kutahya Porselen
- United KingdomUnited KingdomThe United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
- Belleek
- Chelsea porcelain factoryChelsea porcelain factoryThe Chelsea porcelain manufactory is the first important porcelain manufactory in England; its earliest soft-paste porcelain, aimed at the aristocratic market—cream jugs in the form of two seated goats—are dated 1745...
- Coalport
- DavenportDavenport PotteryDavenport Pottery was an English earthenware and porcelain manufacturer based in Longport, Staffordshire,.-History:In 1785, John Davenport , began as a potter working with Thomas Wolfe of Stoke. In 1794, he acquired his own pottery at Longport and began producing cream-coloured blue-printed...
- Goss crested chinaGoss crested chinaGoss crested china is typically in the form of small white glazed porcelain models, made from 1858 to 1939, carrying the coat of arms of the place where they were sold as a souvenir....
- Josiah SpodeJosiah SpodeJosiah Spode was an English potter and the founder of the English Spode pottery works which became very famous for the quality of its wares. He is often credited with the establishment of blue underglaze transfer printing in Staffordshire in 1781–84, and with the definition and introduction in c...
- Josiah WedgwoodJosiah WedgwoodJosiah Wedgwood was an English potter, founder of the Wedgwood company, credited with the industrialization of the manufacture of pottery. A prominent abolitionist, Wedgwood is remembered for his "Am I Not A Man And A Brother?" anti-slavery medallion. He was a member of the Darwin–Wedgwood family...
- Liverpool porcelainLiverpool porcelainLiverpool porcelain is mostly of the soft-paste porcelain type and was produced between 1756 and 1804 in various factories in Liverpool. A portion of the output was exported, mainly to North America. Factories included those of Richard Chaffers, Philip Christian, William Reid, Samuel Gilbody and...
- Mintons Ltd
- New Hall porcelain
- Plymouth PorcelainPlymouth PorcelainPlymouth porcelain was a hard paste porcelain made in the English county of Devon in the 18th century .The porcelain factories at Plymouth and Bristol are noteworthy because they were amongst the earliest English manufacturers of porcelain...
- Rockingham PotteryRockingham PotteryThe Rockingham Pottery was a 19th century manufacturer of porcelain of international repute, supplying fine wares and ornamental pieces to royalty and the aristocracy in Britain and overseas, as well as manufacturing porcelain and earthenware items for ordinary use.It is best known for its finely...
- Royal Crown DerbyRoyal Crown DerbyThe Royal Crown Derby Porcelain Company is a porcelain manufacturer, based in Derby, England. The company, particularly known for its high-quality bone china, has produced tableware and ornamental items since approximately 1750...
- Royal DoultonRoyal DoultonThe Royal Doulton Company is an English company producing tableware and collectables, dating to 1815. Operating originally in London, its reputation grew in The Potteries, where it was a latecomer compared to Spode, Wedgwood and Minton...
- Royal WorcesterRoyal WorcesterRoyal Worcester is believed to be the oldest remaining English pottery brand still in existence today.-Overview:Royal Worcester is a British brand known for its history, provenance and classically English collections of porcelain...
- United StatesUnited StatesThe United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
- Blue Ridge
- FranciscanFranciscan CeramicsFranciscan Ceramics are ceramic tabletop and tile products produced by Gladding, McBean & Co. in Los Angeles, California from 1934–1962, International Pipe and Ceramics from 1962–1979, and Wedgwood from 1979-1983. Wedgwood closed the Los Angeles plant, and moved the production of dinnerware to...
- Lenox
- Lotus WareLotus WareLotus Ware is a type of porcelain produced from approximately 1892 to 1896 at the Knowles, Taylor & Knowles pottery of East Liverpool, Ohio, United States...
- BrazilBrazilBrazil , officially the Federative Republic of Brazil , is the largest country in South America. It is the world's fifth largest country, both by geographical area and by population with over 192 million people...
- Germer Porcelanas Finas
- Porcelana Schmidt
- IranIranIran , officially the Islamic Republic of Iran , is a country in Southern and Western Asia. The name "Iran" has been in use natively since the Sassanian era and came into use internationally in 1935, before which the country was known to the Western world as Persia...
- Zarin porcelain
Further reading
- Combined Nomenclature of the European Communities - EC Commission in Luxembourg, 1987 .
- Burton, William (1906). Porcelain, its Nature, Art and Manufacture. Batsford, London