Your specialist in antique porcelain

Whether very simple or exceptional, the work of hand-crafted porcelain as it was done until the beginning of the 20th century, leaves slight irregularities in the material which gives unique and inimitable charm. The most beautiful pieces, hand painted with sublime decorations, require ancestral know-how and represent hours, or even several days of work ... this is hardly done today, except on pieces reaching exorbitant prices.

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German porcelain is undoubtedly the queen of European porcelain. It was in Meissen that the secret of its manufacture was first revealed. Seeking to imitate the finesse of Chinese porcelain so popular with European nobility, in 1709 the chemist Frédéric Böttger discovered the perfect composition to produce high quality porcelain. Since then, the many German porcelain factories in Saxony and Bavaria (Meissen, Rosenthal, KPM royal factory in Berlin, Seltman, Villeroy & Boch ...) have produced porcelain of the greatest refinement. Find porcelain services from the 19th or early 20th centuries on the eShop. We can cite in particular the famous Sanssouci service, produced since the 19th century by the Rosenthal factory in honor of the Sanssouci palace in Potsdam, eponymous for this magnificent service, already available several times on the Kitchen Brocante eShop.

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In France, there is no need to present Limoges porcelain renowned throughout the world. Cradle of innovation of new techniques in the course of the nineteenth century to produce series of pieces in large quantities and thus reduce costs to make porcelain of exemplary quality accessible to a wider public. The same goes for the East of France, for example with the Sarreguemines factory that I particularly like and whose series of plates or cups are regularly available for sale on the eShop. Old porcelain services that are both refined and popular, with the old-fashioned charm of a country house.

At the same time, the Manufacture Royale de Sèvres has always continued to use an artisanal manufacturing method, sublimating human know-how and still preserving the most cutting-edge and the most successful techniques today, supplying utility parts or ornament most often in a single copy. Certainly the most prestigious factory still in activity, Tableware in all its splendor!

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In Switzerland, Langenthal porcelain is the most common, it was at the beginning of the 20th century of very good quality with decorations often painted by hand. Large vintage cake and cake platters, both decorative and useful, are regularly found online at Kitchen Brocante. Today it is no longer manufactured in Switzerland but in the Czech Republic in an industrial way and in a lower quality.

Extremely rare and sought after, the production of Nyon porcelain lasted only about thirty years, between 1781 to 1813. Well known to amateurs, its rarity is at the height of its beauty, the splendid finishes of its meticulous decorations often including intertwined garlands and ribbons, antique medallions and what characterizes it the most: a seedling of blue or purple flowers enhanced with gilding. The signature of a small blue fish caught in the enamel is easily identifiable. Each antique piece in mottled Nyon porcelain seems like a small miracle. Until the mid-twentieth century, the popular Nyon patterns continued to inspire porcelain artists who (notably for Langenthal) decorated vintage porcelain pieces "in the style of Nyon", often tea sets and dinner plates.

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English porcelain also called Bone China, or bone ash porcelain, is a soft porcelain developed in the 18th century to improve the resistance of soft porcelain.

Characterized by its very high degree of whiteness and transparency, its hardness and its high impact resistance, English porcelain has the reputation of being one of the most refined and noble porcelains. Its composition of 25% kaolin, 25% Cornish stone and 50% bovine bone ash, is the characteristic recipe that gives it all its finesse.

Its typical floral patterns, recognizable among a thousand, give all its charm to this English porcelain which is one of my favorites and of which you will regularly find pretty pieces on the eShop, such as Wedgwood or Mintons.