Boulton's Birds - Part Ten

Influences

The 'rocks' at the foot of the PARADISE BIRD & TREE pattern are a modern interpretation of Chinese designs featuring Gongshi, or "scholar's rocks".
Horace Wain, Boulton's predecessor, had already replicated Gongshi motifs found on 16th- and 17th-century Kang-Hsi and Kien-Lung porcelain. Below is part of Wain's Indian Tree Peony pattern, showing its Gongshi beside Boulton's modern interpretation of the 'rocks'. (See also my article on Wain's Blue Rocks & Blossom pattern, which shows pictures of Gongshi set in a traditional Chinese garden.)

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Sometimes, depending on the space available, only part of the 'rocks' was used. Two versions of Boulton's stylised Gongshi were engraved onto the pattern's copper plate: one smaller and in a different form, giving transferers the flexibility to use either or both to suit the shape.

A significant influence on some of Boulton's later work, including this pattern, surely stems from early 20th-century fairy-tale book illustrators such as Kay Nielsen and Harry Clarke. The picture on the right is from East of the Sun, West of the Moon, a collection of Scandinavian fairy tales, illustrated by Nielsen and published in 1914. Notice the form of the tree with its cascading foliage. It is likely that Cuthbert Wiltshaw, the owner of the pottery, had shown Boulton a copy of this book, probably bought for his four daughters, who were young children in the 1920s.

In 1930, Enoch Boulton was persuaded to move to Fieldings, makers of Crown Devon. Three or so years later, one of the patterns he devised for his new employer replicated elements of Harry Clarke's elaborate illustration titled "She Should Be Queen of the Flowers" from Fairy Tales by Hans Christian Andersen, published by George G. Harrap & Co. Ltd., London, in 1916. Fieldings called the pattern FANTAZIA giving it the pattern number 2444, which I estimate was introduced in 1933/4.
Three or four years earlier, Violet Elmer had adapted parts of the same illustration in her FAIRY GLEN & SWALLOW pattern, named Fantasia by collectors after the later Crown Devon version. (Miss Elmer told us that it was one of her first Best Ware patterns for Carlton Ware, introduced shortly after she took over from Boulton in 1930. Perhaps Cuthbert Wiltshaw had also shown the twenty-three-year-old Violet his children's fairy-tale books.)

The Birds & Butterflies

The copper plate used to print the pattern included two different birds, each flying in opposite directions, as you can see in the image at the top of the page. The engraver also provided both creatures in two sizes. It appears that the two  birds were only used on larger canvases. The exotic birds might have been inspired by the fantastical fowl found on furnishing fabrics, which Boulton appears to have simulated on his earlier CRETONNE pattern.

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Is that a relative of Robbie Williams, bottom right (1), who looks to be placing transfer paper onto a flat copper plate ready to be passed through one of the printing machines? The singer's family hails from The Potteries.

The other printer's assistant behind 'Robbie' (2) is inking the copper plates. The transferers (3), standing at their benches on the left, are placing prints onto ware. The woman standing at the back (4) is holding a pair of scissors about to cut out a print into its required sections. Notice that the Printer at the centre of the photograph is holding up a print of a pattern for dinner or sandwich plates, and that he is wearing a waistcoat, collar and tie. In this printing shop, there are two teams; the second printer can be seen standing at the back wearing a flat cap, and with his two assistants nearby.

PARADISE BIRD & TREE BORDER

Boulton created an abstract, lace-like border for the pattern, unlike any that preceded it. Perhaps the border, too, was inspired by Kay Nielson's work.
Barb has redrawn it for us below. To see how the border was decorated in various colours on this and several other patterns, click or tap on it.

Date of Introduction

Carlton Ware’s pattern records date PARADISE BIRD & TREE 3149 to July 1927, one of the few entries in the archive to include a specific date. This allows us to be reasonably confident that 1927 was the year the pattern was introduced.

Availability

In total, there were 28 variants of the pattern. The first was 3147, which has a BLACK ground. The pattern may have been available into the 1950s since its sister pattern, PARADISE BIRD & TREE with CLOUD — which I discuss in the next article — is found on shapes introduced after 1945, at the end of the Second World War. It was clearly a popular pattern, not only because of its large number of variants, but also because, after the Woods bought the pottery in 1967, they replicated the bird and some of the butterflies in a gold slide-on lithograph, combining it with sprays of peonies similar to those that Horace Wain used in his much earlier Chinosierie patterns. The new, easy-to-apply gold lithograph was made specially for the Woods by one of the many local litho manufacturers supplying the pottery industry. Lithographs were much quicker to apply than traditional printing and painting; they required less skill but gave a flatter appearance, as noticeable on examples. After the litho was applied, it was then raised-enamelled in the traditional way. This new pattern was given the similar name of BIRD OF PARADISE. Below is a comparison of the two patterns.

Notice how the RUBY LUSTRE example above appears more reflective than the pre-war version after its re-formulation during the Second World War for the ROUGE ROYALE decorations. Also, notice that the BIRD OF PARADISE patterns do not have borders. Shortly after buying the pottery in 1967, the Woods sold off all the copper plates from which patterns and borders were printed—for scrap!

The time-honoured method of printing and enamelling had become too expensive and had seen its day. Understandably, the new owners were not prepared to go to the extra expense of commissioning lithographs of borders. The absence of a border on examples using RUBY LUSTRE and POWDER BLUE grounds is an indication that it was made after the Second World War, and during the Woods' ownership of the Carlton Works from 1967 to 1989.

Desk Pen Stands

Harvey Pettit, March 2026.

Thanks must go to Chris Rutter for helping out with the images of coffee cups and saucers.

V2 March 2026. Clarification of techniques and discussion of FAIRY GLEN & SWALLOW / Fantasia. Tweaks and addition of complete index.
If more accurate information comes to light, I will update this page.