Collection
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Decorative Arts and Design

Plate, "Natural Bridge, Virginia"

Enoch Wood & Sons

Brooklyn Museum photograph

Object Label

These ceramics are decorated with American landscape scenes and were made in England for the American market. Before the 1840s, only the elite could afford dinnerware, then made of expensive porcelain. One of the early fruits of the Industrial Revolution was the production of inexpensive machine-molded and mechanically decorated earthenware for the middle class. These objects were decorated by the transfer technique, in which the scene is engraved on a metal plate, inked, printed on paper, and then pressed, or transferred, onto the ceramic body.

Caption

Enoch Wood & Sons (active 1818–1846). Plate, "Natural Bridge, Virginia", ca. 1840. Earthenware, 9 3/16 x 9 3/16 in. (23.3 x 23.3 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Gift of Mrs. Ben P. Grant in memory of Dr. and Mrs. Henry Fleming Payne, 72.184.11. (Photo: Brooklyn Museum)

Gallery

Not on view

Title

Plate, "Natural Bridge, Virginia"

Date

ca. 1840

Geography

Place made: Burslem, Staffordshire, England

Medium

Earthenware

Classification

Ceramic

Dimensions

9 3/16 x 9 3/16 in. (23.3 x 23.3 cm)

Markings

Base printed with spray of flowers and foliage and the legend: "NATURAL BRIDGE / VIRGINIA / E W & S / CELTIC CHINA"; also black numeral "10"

Credit Line

Gift of Mrs. Ben P. Grant in memory of Dr. and Mrs. Henry Fleming Payne

Accession Number

72.184.11

Frequent Art Questions

  • What is the technique used to make these?

    These are what is called transferware. Rather than being hand painted, which was traditionally very expensive and labor-intensive work, these designs were transferred from metal plates, a process derived from printed book illustrations. In fact, many of the decorations would be copied from images in published books.

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Artists and makers

Enoch Wood & Sons

85 works in the collection