A Passion for Blue Since 1775
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A PASSION FOR BLUE SINCE 1775 2018 INDEX A PASSION FOR BLUE SINCE 1775 THE TALE OF FLOWERS THE HISTORY & THE CRAFT IS A TALE OF LOVE P. 2-19 PATTERN INSPIRATIONS P. 20-41 When nature effortlessly and generously gives her beauty to the world, colouring each season. When a child picks a flower from the garden to give to her mother. The first flower we receive from a very special RANGE OVERVIEW someone. BLUE FLUTED PLAIN P. 44 The flower nervously placed in a button hole. The flower that follows those BLUE FLUTED MEGA three little words. The flowers she holds as she walks down the aisle. P. 46 BLUE ELEMENTS Flowers to celebrate. Flowers for good luck. Flowers as the purest symbol P. 48 of love, saying more than words can. ALPHABET MUGS P. 50 Their beauty is short-lived – they bud, blossom and then wither. WHITE FLUTED It is an exclusive, rare moment; one can’t really own it, only borrow and P. 52 experience it. A reminder to appreciate the present moment, STAR FLUTED CHRISTMAS before it is overtaken by the next. P. 54 When a flower is carefully painted onto fine porcelain, those passing moments are kept alive. Each piece reminding you of the moments in life GENERAL INFORMATION that really matter; the occasion on which the porcelain was given to you, P. 56-64 carefully handed over. Moments in life that are elevated and become treasures. Each piece of porcelain holds a story of love for you to keep. WWW.ROYALCOPENHAGEN.COM.AU 69 THE HISTORY & THE CRAFT 1888 1911 1915 1972 Four examples of the Royal Crown as it changed its shape over time. The meaning behind the symbol remains the same. AN ENTREPRENEURIAL MONARCH who in 1763 founded a porcelain factory in Berlin. Juliane Marie was the widow of King Frederik V and Although the siblings corresponded, the secret for came to power in Denmark and Norway when her porcelain manufacturing was not shared between late husband’s son from his first marriage became them and it was only in 1774 that porcelain was FOUNDED IN 1775 UNDER mentally ill and was unable to govern. Juliane first produced in Copenhagen. Finally, Juliane Marie was a strong woman with a good grasp of the Marie and the Danish royal family had their own needs of the time. Via her European contacts, she valuable porcelain production, like other European THE PATRONAGE OF THE QUEEN had understood that a combination of knowledge monarchies. and the use of local raw materials would improve local living conditions. Like many other European THE ROYAL CROWN AND THE DOWAGER JULIANE MARIE monarchs, she supported research in natural THREE WAVES science. It was no longer theology but science that Juliane Marie was adamant from the start that each would improve life on earth, hence her interest piece of Royal Copenhagen porcelain would be in mineralogy and the raw materials for porcelain stamped with its unique factory mark: the three production. hand-painted waves that symbolise Denmark’s Juliane Marie was known as a modern queen and a waterways, the ‘Oresund’ or Sound, the Great strong supporter of the country. It was the task of the FROM A GOOD PORCELAIN FAMILY Belt and the Little Belt. The queen also introduced reigning monarch to safeguard the country’s economic The production of porcelain was not entirely the royal crown stamp to highlight the factory’s unknown to Juliane Marie. Her brother, Charles royal association. The crown has changed over health with the development of domestic products and I of Brunswick- Wolfenbüttel had also founded time and can be used to date each piece of Royal services. Her greatest legacy was founding the Royal Danish a porcelain factory in Fürstenberg, Germany. In Copenhagen. On the Royal Copenhagen website, Porcelain Factory in 1775. addition, their sister was married to Frederik II there is a list of the crowns and the corresponding of Prussia, one of Europe’s absolute monarchs time periods. 2 3 A PASSION FOR BLUE THE HISTORY & THE CRAFT Blue. The colour of love, and spirituality. Of Gods and the divine. Of the ocean and Royal Copenhagen’s blue pigment is called cobalt zinc silicate and it is the cobalt of the celestial sky. For millennia, the colour blue has inspired artists’ words and that provides the distinctive blueness. In its infancy, Royal Copenhagen obtained images. It has also been one of the most expensive and difficult colours to obtain. their cobalt from Norwegian ‘Blaafarveværket’, the ‘blue colour factory’ a company that was responsible for between 70 and 80 percent of all global cobalt production Almost 7000 years ago, the Egyptians would crush the blue stone Lapiz Lazuli into throughout the 19th century. a fine powder to use as pigment for eye makeup and murals on walls. Much later, medieval painters learned to use the stone’s colour to manufacture paint, attaining BLUE – LITTLE AND LARGE the colour ultramarine. Karen Blixen describes the colour in her winter tale ‘The In Denmark, we consider Blue Fluted Plain part of our cultural heritage and something Young Man with the Carnation’. “Oh I have found it at last. This is the true blue. Oh, we all have a connection to in one way or another. Passed down from generation to how light it makes one. It is as fresh as a breeze, as deep as a deep secret, as full as generation, pieces of Blue Fluted Plain can be found in many Danish homes. I say not what.” Quote from Old Lady Helena when she was presented with the blue- Over the centuries, Royal Copenhagen has produced between 1,500 and 2,000 painted Chinese jar. different kinds of cups, jugs, bowls and plates; all hand-painted to the last detail. There have also been more unusual pieces in the series. In the early 1800s, Blue Fluted Plain was highly desirable and the pattern could be found on everything from washbasins to chamber pots. 4 5 THE HISTORY & THE CRAFT “I had not long arrived when I found a Blue Fluted Plain plate, one from the old days. I observed its loveliness, the shine of its surface, its charm, its slightly grey-green whiteness, its dreamy indigo blue colour fusing with the mass. This was porcelain, genuine, pure, unsullied by human hand. ... It was this pristine plate that opened my eyes to a new world, from which I picked out my little part ... I kept this old blue-painted plate with me as my Bible. Alas, I never achieved its perfection. Times have much changed. The mass has become purer, whiter, the glaze and colour, too. But this little veil of grey-green, reminiscent of the air over the sea on a still summer’s morning before the sun has risen was hopelessly lost.” ARNOLD KROG 6 7 PRIZE-WINNING ROYAL PORCELAIN Since 1775, every piece of porcelain that has left Royal Copenhagen carries its factory marks; the three waves, the royal crown and the painter’s mark. These are symbols of authenticity, the royal connection and the mark of handcraftsmanship. THE THREE BLUE WAVES THE ROYAL CROWN When the Dowager Queen Juliane Marie The crown symbolises Royal Copenhagen’s founded the Royal Porcelain Factory in 1775, beginnings in the hands of the entrepreneurial she insisted that the three waves should be monarchy. The crown was initially painted by the factory’s trademark. The waves symbolise hand, but by the 1870’s, the company began to Denmark’s three most important bodies of stamp the mark under the glaze. The crown is water; the Sound, the Great Belt and the Little decorated with the "Dagmar Cross", a jewelled Belt. To this day, the waves are painted on the crucifix dating from the Middle Ages that was back of each piece of porcelain and comprise discovered in 1690. Over the years, the crown Royal Copenhagen’s well-known signature of has changed but it is possible to identify the authenticity, a mark of fine craftsmanship and year or decade in which each piece of porcelain Danish porcelain art. was manufactured. Here are some examples of the crown’s evolution through time. For more information, please refer to the Royal Copenhagen website. 8 9 THE HISTORY & THE CRAFT PORCELAIN MARKS OVERVIEW 1870–1890 1887–1892 1892 1894–1900 Stamp in blue Stamp in violet or Stamp in red or green Crown and DANMARK under the glaze red over the glaze over the glaze, used on stamped in green request from USA for under the glaze, blue THE CRAFTSMAN’S MARK export goods wave mark It takes four years to learn the craft of painting on Royal Copenhagen porcelain. And although it may be difficult for a layperson to distinguish one Blue Fluted Plain design 1889–1922 1905 1921 1923 from another, accomplished painters always know their own Crown and ROYAL Hand-painted mark in Hand-painted mark Crown and COPENHAGEN stamp blue under the glaze, used for productions DENMARK stamped work, as they know their own personal handwriting. in green under the used for Juliane Marie made in China in green under the glaze, blue wave mark porcelain (originally glaze, blue wave on reproductions of mark 18th century models) Each painter had (and still has) their own stamp, marked on the bottom of every piece of porcelain. Some of the painters are well-known, but some are now a mystery. 1935–1949 1950–1984 1985– Dot above a selected Dot below a selected letter Dot above one/two selected letter in ROYAL or in ROYAL, DENMARK or letter(s) in ROYAL or under COPENHAGEN COPENHAGEN COPENHAGEN R 1935 R 1950 C 1962 RO 1985-1991 O 1936 O 1951 O 1963 RY 1992-1999 Y 1937 Y 1952 P 1964 RA 2000-2004 A 1938 A 1953 E 1965 RL 2005-2009 L 1939 L 1954 N 1966 RC 2010-2014 H 1967 RO 2015-2019 C 1940 D 1955 A 1968 O 1941 E 1956 G 1969-1973 P 1942 N 1957 E 1974-1978 E 1943 M 1958 N 1979-1983 N 1945 A 1959 H 1946 R 1960 A 1947 K 1961 G 1948 E 1949 N 1950 10 11 COPENHAGEN STATE OF MIND Copenhagen.