DinnerwareDinnerware & Serving Pieces

The producers of Denby Dinnerware get a royal visit

One of the main pottery’s in Derbyshire is Denby the manufacturers of Denby Dinnerware, have recently celebrated 200 years of pottery manufacturing. To commemorate this significant occasion, HRH The Princess Royal visited Denby on the 12th September 2011. HRH The Princess Royal was shown how both time-honored skills and new technology have been integrated to allow more challenging patterns to be created but still produced in the established Denby style. A tour of the design studio was a central part of the tour highlighting how the design team now creates pieces for numerous countries throughout the world.

Denby in Derbyshire is home to the Denby pottery. The pottery was started in the early 1800′s after a vein of clay was discovered in the neighborhood. A local entrepreneur’s son, Joseph Bourne, quickly built up a small but thriving pottery company making stoneware bottles and jars. He rapidly extended from the UK into international markets. The Denby jar is well-known for its shiny brown glaze that was produced by burning salt in the drying kiln creating salt vapour to color the surface to the shiny brown.

From the late 1800′s, to counter the growth of glass bottles taking market share from their ceramic line, Denby started making kitchenware with richly coloured glazes. By the 1920′s they had a decorative giftware collection known as ‘Danesby Ware’. In the 1930′s ‘Electric Blue’ and ‘Orient Ware’ grew to be classic giftware ranges and is still much sought after by collectors today.

Throughout the 1950′s Denby moved to become principally a producer of tableware including cups, saucers and plates. In the 1970′s they changed the landscape forever by manufacturing an ‘oven-to-tableware’ range. This meant there was no longer a need to serve food in different dishes to those it had been cooked in. The dishes were able to face up to oven temperatures but furthermore have fantastic decorative finishes for the table.

The Denby range nowadays is designed and produced for use for cooking, serving and eating from without the need to use additional dishes. It’s lead and cadmium free which makes it especially safe to cook and eat from. The whole range is oven, microwave, dishwasher and freezer safe. The glazes are exceedingly strong based on 200 years or knowledge handed down giving the range a beautiful sheen which is easy to clean and hard to chip.

Denby’s contemporary ranges like Jet, Azure and Fire build on the proud heritage of the company but bring a modern and up to date image to the products. Much of the present success is right down to the skills and understanding of previous generations of craftsmen. The company has also not lost sight of its earlier success which has helped it to retain their popularity as being a supplier of leading stoneware built on a tradition of quality and durability.

To mark their 200th anniversary a variety of special edition items were launched. Manufacturedin Pure Green, Imperial Blue, Linen, Truffle, Jet and China by Denby, patterned Mini One Cup Teapot’s were beautifully packaged and numbered which has a certificate of authenticity. At the other end of the size scale the Denby One Pint Mug available in Imperial Blue, Regency Green and Linen was a large copy of the initial iconic Craftsman’s Mug. The Pure Green pattern was the initial Denby bicentenary pattern with only limited quantities produced for the bicentenary that has a full range of place setting’s and accessories.

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