A Ceramic Art Pottery Card Holder by Michael W. Moses Incorporating an Antique Doulton's Silicon Ware Piece

Michael W. Moses Art Pottery Card Holder

This post is featuring a piece of ceramic art pottery that I started working on quite a while back.  I was making a point of sales card holder for South Coast Antiques & Gallery.  I had it fired and I put it to the side when I found out that we were going to have to move out of the shop so that a restaurant and bar, could replace us.  Well, I got looking at it and thinking about it and I figured that I would just go ahead and finish it any way. So, there.  It was just as simple as that.

I went ahead and painted it, glazed it, fired it, and then attached the accessory piece.

The attached piece is a great antique piece of art pottery that was made by Doulton of England. This piece was originally a small jug with a handle, but sadly the handle was broken off somewhere along the way.  When I purchased this piece I was so dissapointed that it was broken.  In the past I have usually avoided broken items, but this little piece seemed to nice not to give it a second chance.

I was so suprised to see that it was marked Doulton Lambeth 1883.  Usually when there are numbers on the bottom of a vase or other cermaic piece they usuaally are nothing more than mold marks or a pattern number.  In this case the 1883 is actually the date when this piece was made. This piece is maked Silicon. I had not heard of Silicon ware before I saw this piece.  I have found that it was a major type of art pottery during the late Victorian era. Silicon ware was made by the company that we know as Royal Doulton today.  When this piece was made it was only known as Doulton.

Michael W. Moses Doulton Silicon Ware Vase Attachment

I also have to say that from almost the moment that I laid eyes upon this tiny art pottery vase, it is only 3½ inches from top to bottom, I knew that I would incorporate it into this card holder.  It always gives me such great satisfaction when I have an image of a piece of ceramic art pottery fully realized in my mind and then see it sitting in front of me compleatly finished.

After 129 years and being broken and then being sold to me, this tiny work of art is hopefully going to be able to survive for maybe another hundred years or so with a bit of luck.

As a bit of an aside. While I was taking the pictures of my card holder I was interrupted by one of my two kittens, His name is Spot. He was not going to leave until I took a few glamour shots of him. Here is one of them for your kitty viewing pleasure.

"Spot", M W Moses' Little Kitty