The painted features of this porcelain doll face point to the work of firms in the Thuringia area of Germany. Thuringia’s natural clay deposits made it the center of the German doll industry. This doll likely once included glass enamel eyes and a…
Students, almshouse residents, and homemakers all crafted buttons out of cleaned cow bones. The carving required few tools and little skill. The incomplete button blank on the center of this board still shows a fragment of the larger bone from which…
Sugar boxes held sugar to sweeten tea and coffee or to make unpalatable wine drinkable. This nearly-intact pearlware example from the early 1800s has a hand-painted garland design.
Salt-glazed earthware jars replaced lead-glazed vessels for food storage as the dangers of lead became common knowledge. Once filled, treated paper or cloth formed a seal over the open mouth. Cookbooks in the nineteenth century recommended these jars…
Henry Stiegel’s distinctive thin-walled drinking glasses became popular in the Philadelphia area after his emigration from Germany in 1750. His technique spread to other glasshouses after his death. Pieces in the style were sometimes produced at the…
The “Willow” pattern of this teaware piece imitates the designs used on Chinese porcelain that became popular imports in the nineteenth century. A number of American firms utilized the pattern or a variation of it in their designs.