page_title: Chelsea porcelain factory
section_title: Red anchor period (1752–1756)
hierarchical_section_title: Chelsea porcelain factory / Periods by marks / Red anchor period (1752–1756)
caption_attribution_description: British, Chelsea; Toy; Ceramics-Porcelain
context_page_description: Chelsea porcelain is the porcelain made by the Chelsea porcelain manufactory, the first important porcelain manufactory in England, established around 1743–45, and operating independently until 1770, when it was merged with Derby porcelain. It made soft-paste porcelain throughout its history, though there were several changes in the "body" material and glaze used. Its wares were aimed at a luxury market, and its site in Chelsea, London, was close to the fashionable Ranelagh Gardens pleasure ground, opened in 1742.
  The first known wares are the "goat and bee" cream jugs with seated goats at the base, some examples of which are incised with "Chelsea", "1745" and a triangle. The entrepreneurial director, at least from 1750, was Nicholas Sprimont, a Huguenot silversmith in Soho, but few private documents survive to aid a picture of the factory's history. Early tablewares, being produced in profusion by 1750, depend on Meissen porcelain models and on silverware prototypes, such as salt cellars in the form of realistic shells.
  Chelsea was known for its figures, initially mostly single standing figures of the Cries of London and other subjects.
context_section_description: As at Meissen and  Chantilly some time earlier, imitations of Japanese export porcelain in the Kakiemon style were popular from the late 1740s until around 1758. These were copied both from the Continental imitations and Japanese originals, and some apparently freshly created in the style.
  Some tableware was decorated with bold and botanically accurate paintings of plants, known as "botanical" pieces, which essentially take onto porcelain the style of the large botanical book illustrations that were beginning to be produced, and often hand-coloured.  The factory was very close to the Chelsea Physic Garden (founded 1673 and still open on the same site), which may have influenced the approach, and at least provided illustrated books as models.  Some pieces were copied from various books, including those by Philip Miller, the director of the gardens (the eighth edition of  The Gardener's Dictionary (1752) and Figures of Plants, vol 1, 1755) and Georg Dionysius Ehret.  An advertisement in 1758 offered "Table Plates, Soup Plates, and Desart Plates enamelled from the Hans Sloane's Plants" (Sloane had set up the garden's current site in 1722).
  These innovative pieces exerted a long-lasting influence on porcelain design, especially in Britain, and similar styles have seen a strong revival from the late 20th century, led by Portmeirion Pottery's "Botanic Garden" range, launched in 1972, using designs adapted from Thomas Green's Universal or-Botanical, Medical and Agricultural Dictionary (1817).
  The small "Toys", which become prominent in this period, may have been copied from the elusive "Girl-in-a Swing" factory, now usually located at St James's, an even more fashionable location in the West End of London, which was active about 1751–54.  This seems to have been connected to the Chelsea factory in some way.  Another development was tureens and sometimes other large forms in the shapes of animals, birds or plants.
  Examples of fairly exact copying of Meissen wares are the "Monkey Band" (Affenkapelle or "ape orchestra" in German), a group of ten figures of monkey musicians, and a larger excited conductor, all in fancy contemporary costumes. Such singeries were popular in various media.
caption: A "Chelsea Toy" in the form of a basket of fruit, width 2 3/4 inches (4.1 × 7 cm), c. 1755, inscribed "MON AMOUR LES A CUEILLI POUR VOUS" ("my love gathered these for you").
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