Condition: Excellent condition, no chips cracks or restoration.  For completeness I should mention a very slight indentation in the lip which happened before firing and which has made the glaze a little different but this is not damage but a feature of a handmade piece.

This is a superb example of work by a potter who is currently surprisingly undervalued in the market, given the quality and variety of her output and the recognition she has won among her peers, compared especially to her fellow salt glaze pioneer Walter Keeler.  The reason for this may be that her work has always been labelled as functional, whereas in reality the functional form is always for her a springboard to creativity.

The jug is thrown and altered in shape, and has a very pleasing balance, with a narrow but solid base and a slight curvature to the sides. As usual with Jane Hamlyn, it is decorated with rouletting and is finished in manganese, cobalt blue and titanium oxide before the final salt glaze firing at about 1300 degrees.

Jane Hamlyn (born 1940) worked initially as a nurse before taking up pottery. She studied at the Harrow School of Art where she was taught by Michael Casson.  In 1975, she set up Millfield Pottery Workshop near Doncaster Yorkshire, where she still lives and works. She is a Fellow and former chair of the Craft Potters Association.   Her work is displayed at the Victoria & Albert Museum London, in the Crafts Council Permanent Collection,  and the William Alfred Ismay ceramics collection at the York Art Gallery.

Hamlyn was appointed Member of the Order of the British Empire (MBE) in the 2022 Birthday Honours for services to pottery and ceramics.