This led to me purchasing my first couple of pieces from Dorothy, both of which had been featured in her book. From then on I watched for other pieces, both on ebay, at the local markets and garage sales, and at antique and collectable fairs. At the same time I bought my first piece of Classic Art Ware, a highly glazed grey koala sitting on a stump, with applied gumnuts and gumleaves. Over the ensuing months I began to notice that along with the various koala vases bearing the CAW sticker, there were also a number of Delamere pieces that also carried the same sticker.
It did not take a great leap to realise that all of these pieces bore common "signatures", in glaze colours, markings and shared design features. This prompted an active and interesting thread on the Australian ebay forums involving other collectors of these potteries, where it became apparent that these pieces were indeed all a product of the Delamere Pottery, based in Sydney. This has been since confirmed by Dorothy Johnston in 2 articles in the Collectable Trader magazine in 2010, although she claims the original Classic Art Ware label belonged to John Barnard Knight, a potter from Melbourne, and that the Delamere koalas were copies of his original work. To, date, however, no collector I have spoken to has been able to identify any connection between John Knight and Classic Art Ware.
Delamere Pottery was operational in Leichhardt, Sydney, from 1945 to1960. Established originally by Emma (Maude) Johnston , who studied modelling under John Castle Harris at East Sydney Technical College, it also involved her sons, Clyde and Robert (Bob) who joined forces with her after returning from service in WWII.
This blog is intended to showcase my collection of Delamere and Classic Art Ware pottery, and I will add photos to it as I get time.
Just go to the drop down menu at the top of the page to click on the month for a look at the wide range of art pottery produced by Delamere.
I can see that part sticker on your Budgie vase is Rosalie. I bought a CAW curved gum leaf trough and it has the Rosalie sticker and an written signature underneath. Eureka I have found a marked one !!!
ReplyDeleteBut it is so feint that I can not read it...how unlucky is that????
Pip, I have a little sponge glazed sombrero with the Rosalie sticker as well - I was wondering if anyone would pick it up :-) What can't you read, the sticker or the signature? It would be interesting to know if it is a distribution label for an outlet or a Delamere range sticker. Another mystery to ferret out info on :-)
ReplyDeleteIt's the signature that I can not read. It is there and it is quite long and I believe that it says Delamere Art Ware as there are gaps in the words but my husband thinks it says Rosalie ! So no closer to solving this mystery yet.
ReplyDeleteHi, thank you for this information, I have been looking for Delamere information for ages, I have a small collection that I started about 3 years ago and I have 3 nice pieces you may want to list in the above, they are all incised Delamere underneath. Kind regards, Nick
ReplyDeleteHi Nick, I can't seem to find any contact details for you, but your offer of the use of pics of your pieces is much appreciated. Can you contact me through the site to send copies?
ReplyDeletecheers
Leonie