Mug
Doulton and Co
Category
Ceramics
Date
1880 - 1890
Materials
Stoneware
Measurements
80 mm (Height); 75 mm (Diameter)
Place of origin
Lambeth
Order this imageCollection
Hill Top, Cumbria
NT 641393
Summary
Mug, brown stoneware, slightly tapering form with loop handle, flat base; sprigged decoration around the body in white stoneware and a brown glazed body, applied 'Moorish' arcading with palmette finials, a band of deep brown glaze beneath the rim, the handle with an impressed foliate design. Made by Doulton & Co. (Ltd), Lambeth, decorated by Elizabeth Atkins, 1880-90.
Full description
This mug is from the collection at Hill Top. Beatrix Potter purchased this farmhouse in the Lake District village of Near Sawrey in 1905, using the profits from her books. After her marriage to William Heelis in 1913, Beatrix relocated permanently to Sawrey. The couple made nearby Castle Cottage their home, but Beatrix spent as much time as she could at Hill Top. As well as a space for work and creativity – and the location for many of her famous tales – it became an intensely personal sanctuary for Beatrix. Beatrix knew exactly how she would decorate Hill Top and she arranged its interiors carefully and deliberately. She wrote: ‘I would have old furniture…it is not as expensive as modern furniture, and incomparably handsomer…’ Once she had renovated the farmhouse, she filled it with examples of local furniture and treasured heirlooms, like her grandmother’s warming pan and a set of plates decorated with designs by her father. By her own admission, Beatrix was ‘conceited about arranging china’ and liked things to be in their proper place (1). When Beatrix bought Hill Top, the hall was fitted with the cast iron range that can been seen in a watercolour illustration for the frontispiece of The Tale of Samuel Whiskers (NT243400). Mrs Tabitha Twitchit and Cousin Ribby sit in chairs in front of the range, Tabitha crying as she has lost Tom Kitten and fears the rats might have taken him. The mantelpiece above the range has been drawn on a separate piece of paper that appears to have been pasted onto the drawing, presumably obscuring an earlier version. It appears that Beatrix’s ‘conceit about arranging china’ even extended into the version of her world she created for Tabitha Twitchett and Ribby. Beatrix later removed the range and replaced it with an open fire, which is captured in an undated photograph in the collection of the Victoria and Albert Museum (V&A BP.1299C). A bust of Wesley (NT641390) and a Pratt ware jug (NT641425), both made about 1820 and visible in the earlier watercolour, remained in place. They were joined by a figure of an owl (NT641533), a sprigged stoneware jug and cover of about 1850 (NT641395), this Doulton Lambeth mug of about 1880-90 by Elizabeth Atkins (NT641393) and another Doulton jug commemorating Queen Victoria’s diamond jubilee (NT641391). At each end was a wooden painted figure of Peter Rabbit. This display was still in place in 1946 following Beatrix’s death and, for the most part, remains today. Elizabeth Atkins was an artist, designer and decorator at Doulton’s Lambeth workshop, where she worked from about 1876-99.
Marks and inscriptions
EA (potter's initials)
Makers and roles
Doulton and Co, manufacturer Elizabeth Atkins (fl.1876 - 1899), decorator