Early Staffordshire pearlware and creamware pottery figures

Lakin & Poole

4/18/2010

While it lasts, you may want to look at this rare figure on Aurea Carter's site . The figure is rare in form, and it is impressed with a particularly rare mark.

The figure depicts Ganymede, cup bearer to the gods. To state the obvious, he holds a cup in his hand. The mark on the figure is especially uncommon: LAKIN & POOLE. This mark helps us date the figure with some precision, because the Burslem partnership between Thomas Lakin and John Ellison Poole lasted only from 1791-1796. Lakin and Poole figures and groups are quite recognizable because they share common features: they stand on subtly marbled bases, the figures have receding chins, the style is neoclassical, the color palettte is very pastel, the titling (when found) is beautifully done with the precision associated with print rather than free-hand painting.

Impress this figure on your mind and it will help you recognize other Lakin & Poole figures. There aren't many, but they are all so interesting.

2 Comments

Richard

9/21/2012 10:03:49 am

I have this same figure of Ganymede. It's identical except for the color palette. Unlike this Lakin and Poole version the base on mine is painted with exactingly beautiful multi-coloured floral sprigs around the perimeter of the base and one large one on the flat in front of the stump and Ganymede's left leg. Do you know who else might have made this figure if, as you say, all of Lakin and Poole's had marbleized bases? Thank you.

Myrna Schkolne

9/22/2012 01:15:53 am

Hi Richard,
A marbled base is not a requirement for Lakin and Poole. I have seen your figure of Ganymede and it is decorated in underglaze colors, rather than the enamels you see here. There is no evidence that Lakin and Poole decorated thus. In fact, Lakin was a bit of a "scientist" when it came to enamels and I can understand that being his preferred method of coloring. I expect that after the firm closed the mold was sold on in the Potteries. The pot bank that acquired it probably made your figure. We don't know this for certain, but this seems a very reasonable conclusion--and a mold form alone is never a basis for an attribution. Best wishes,
Myrna