Teco Pottery vase
notes: label: Description (Brief)
content: Tall molded form has a wide base rounding to long inward tapering body without shoulders. The vase is pushed inward near the top and finished with a cup like shape supported by four vertical buttresses attached to the rim and mid-way on the body. Overall crystalline matt glaze thicker in some areas over a buff-yellow clay body. Impressed on bottom with "Teco" and "269." This vase was designed by William B Mundie (1863-1939).
label: Description
content: Before becoming an international phenomenon, the Arts and Crafts movement began with the ideas of British artisan William Morris (1834-1896) and writer John Ruskin (1819-1900). Morris and Ruskin believed that the growth of cities isolated urban workers and that mass production negatively affected artisan crafts. They proposed to solve these issues by returning to a medieval-inspired village model where everybody participated in a community lifestyle. In the United States, artisans adapted these ideas into the studio art pottery movement. Unlike their British counterparts, who often focused predominantly on social issues and therefore made objects that incorporated Gothic and Renaissance motifs, American craftsmen developed a cohesive and novel aesthetic.
label: Description
content: This slender green matte vase was manufactured by the Teco Pottery, founded by William D. Gates (1852-1935). The name for the company came from the amalgamation of “terra cotta,” and they produced hundreds of these simplified, monochromatic forms from around 1902 to 1929. Although the wares date from the early twentieth-century, collectors often note that their innovative forms reference mid-century modern designs and colors. Unlike its later counterparts, however, this vase violates one of the fundamental tenants of mid-century design – “form follows function” – as its four geometric handles are purely ornamental.
label: Description
content: Like their many of their competitors, including Rookwood and Van Briggle, Teco developed a matte green glaze that strongly alluded to the Grueby Faience Company’s waxy finish. Because of its origins as an architectural ceramics company, however, Teco reinterpreted these vases as monumental silvery-green forms over seven feet high – a unique feat among turn-of-the-century potteries.
label: Description
content: This slender green matte vase was manufactured by the Teco Pottery, founded by William D. Gates (1852-1935). The name for the company came from the amalgamation of “terra cotta,” and they produced hundreds of these simplified, monochromatic forms from around 1902 to 1929. Although the wares date from the early twentieth-century, collectors often note that their innovative forms reference mid-century modern designs and colors. Unlike its later counterparts, however, this vase violates one of the fundamental tenants of mid-century design – “form follows function” – as its four geometric handles are purely ornamental.
label: Description
content: Like their many of their competitors, including Rookwood and Van Briggle, Teco developed a matte green glaze that strongly alluded to the Grueby Faience Company’s waxy finish. Because of its origins as an architectural ceramics company, however, Teco reinterpreted these vases as monumental silvery-green forms over seven feet high – a unique feat among turn-of-the-century potteries.
label: Location
content: Currently not on view
place: label: place made
content: United States: Illinois, Chicago
topic: label: web subject
content: Art Pottery
setName: label: See more items in
content: Home and Community Life: Ceramics and Glass
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content: Art
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content: Domestic Furnishings
dataSource: label: Data Source
content: National Museum of American History
identifier: label: ID Number
content: CE.237,958
label: catalog number
content: 237958
objectType: label: Object Name
content: Vase
physicalDescription: label: Physical Description
content: monochrome, green (overall surface decoration color name)
label: Physical Description
content: ceramic (overall material)