Wedgwood Figures

Sold at Skinner this week were some rather unusual figures marked WEDGWOOD. Figures marked thus are generally not believed to have been made by the Wedgwood manufactory. Possibly  they were made for Wedgwood--the firm may have needed to fill orders it didn't want to produce. Some of the figures are very similar to those formed from molds that Enoch Wood used--so perhaps EW made some of these figures for Wedgwood. More probably, the figures were made by Ralph Wedgwood, who potted in the 1790s. The figures are consistent with that period, and given the fame of the Wedgwood name even then, Ralph would have been stupid not to jump on the bandwagon and mark his wares.

The figure of Charity, above, was sold at Skinner. It is impressed CHARITY on the front, and WEDGWOOD behind. Another like it is in the Potteries Museum.

The boy with dog and girl with cat, here marked Wedgwood, were also sold at Skinner. See another example similarly marked on p224 of my book. An example of the boy with dog also occurs marked "T. Smith."  This is the mark of Theophilus Smith. He was a prosperous potter in the late 1790s. Unfortunately, he came to a bitter end. His wife had an affair, and Theophilus tried to kill the 'other man.'  For this, he landed in jail. His wife came to visit him (dumb? repentant?), whereupon Theophilus tried to kill her before turning his weapon on himself with fatal consequences. He died in 1802.

Fascinating Factoids.

• The WEDGWOOD mark, as found on Staffordshire figures, sometimes has a period (or a 'full stop', if you are reading this in the UK) after it. Were figures marked WEDGWOOD. made by someone other than the potter who marked his wares WEDGWOOD only? Who knows.
• Josiah Wedgwood was the first potter to mark his wares. He introduced the concept of branding. Wedgwood understood the concepts of marketing, way before the MBA had been invented.

So back to the Wedgwood figures. Lord knows who made them. We really can only speculate. But it is always nice to own a marked figure, because it does force you to ponder these things.