Maker: Josiah Spode
Period: Georgian
The stylish Georgian coffee cup and saucer faithfully reproduce, in Spode bone china, Barr Worcester originals made of soft-paste porcelain sometime between 1795 and 1880.
Spode ran a thriving side business in meeting demand for replicas of shapes and patterns made by other factories. Usually this was to replace damaged or missing parts of a set.
The same Spode coffee cup and saucer are shown together with the Barr Worcester original in ‘Matchings Produced by Spode,’ an article by Spode collector Geoffrey Fisk published in Vol. 15, 1998 of the Northern Ceramic Society Journal (see Figure 27 on page 117). Fisk wrote that the ‘cup shape is not standard Spode and the ring handle is seldom found on Spode pieces.’
When the Spode factory matched the Barr Worcester originals is unknown, except that it would have been before Spode was taken over by Copeland & Garrett in 1833.
‘Spode’ is painted in red on the bases of the cup and saucer, without the usual Spode pattern number.
Condition Excellent/VG. Patches of minor rubbing to two lower gilt bands around the cup.
Cup Height: 6.5 cm; Diameter: 8 cm; Width, with handle: 10 cm
Saucer Diameter: 14 cm
Medium: Bone china (porcelain)
Origin: Stoke-on-Trent, England
Net weight: 202 g
See Spode and Copeland in Makers & Artists for background on the factory
