• Style/technique: Gothic majolica
• Manufacturer: Mintons China Works
• Designed by: A W N Pugin
• Pattern number: 894/3
• Dimensions: 6" x 6"
• Date: circa 1893

 

A very rare A W N Pugin quatrefoil design moulded in high relief yet with subtlety and fine detail. In lead glaze majolica, embossed and deeply indented and glazed in four colours with extremely high brilliance. Pure gothic modern majolica (lead glazed) tiles are really quite rare especially multicolour designs, I know because I collect them. The development of such glazes coincided with the end of the aesthetic and floral tile style periods and the onset of art nouveau, gothic was a footnote already yet is at its most expressive when represented in brilliant lead glazes.

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Condition: Very fine
Price: £95 (approx $170)
Ref: 02681B

Bottom corners fractionally nibbled for the original fitting, minute chip just above bottom left corner, extremely light surface marks, very minor manufacturing flaws. Outstandingly clean and bright and the most excellent brilliance in the glazes..

Condition: Very fine
Price: £95 (approx $190)
Ref: 02681D

Touch of wear just above bottom right corner and on the bottom near left corner, extremely light surface marks, minor manufacturing flaws - blue has bubbled on the top and upper right edges. Outstandingly clean and bright and the most excellent brilliance in the glazes.

Following Campbell's death in 1885 it appears that Minton's new management introduced colour in to the tile works as previously the tile works had decorated only with printing and a few moulded monochrome glazed majolica tiles painted tiles being done in the pottery. At first this was hand colouring of prints and handpainted 'slabs' from the pottery which were advertised in their tile catalogues, in the mid 1890s this extended to modern majolica wares which were embraced whole-heartedly with modern designs in brilliant colours. This tile appears to predate these and was probably to some extent experimental.

Pattern number 894 predates the separation of Minton & Co in to Minton Hollins and Mintons China Works in 1868 and being in the gothic style this design will be the work of A W N Pugin [1]. Mintons China Works often reissued old patterns using the last processes, patterns which originally were designed for encaustic tiles were later made in print and some again in modern majolica, it would be natural for them to select an old design on which to test new processes.

[1] in the introduction to the 1885 Mintons China Works catalogue it says, "The process for the decoration of Tiles was early favoured by the late Mr A Welby Pugin, "the great restorer of Gothic Art," in the Houses of Parliament and in many other places, and the patterns in that style of ornament in this book are all from his hand". This design does not appear in the pattern book but pattern numbers up to 1325 in the gothic style do and this is therefore attributed to Pugin.

We acquired several of these tiles from an original fitting in furniture and have a set of ten available which are excellent for use in a period fireplace of the gothic style.

Versos are spotlessly clean and unnamed but have three varieties of attributed Mintons grids and some have the pattern number painted in glaze.

The image is full size at 72 dpi (about 430 pixels wide) in maximum quality JPEG format and on screen is about the size as it would be in real life at the same distance. A larger 120 dpi image also in maximum quality JPEG format can be forwarded by email if required.

The image is a little oversize rather than cropped close to the edges so that the edges can easily be seen and any chips etc can be quickly spotted. Other marks described are usually not visible at all when the tile is viewed straight as one normally sees it and can only be seen with a critical eye when the tile is tilted to catch imperfections in reflected light. For more details of how we describe marks see Condition.