Rare Signed (Late 1930s) English Newport Pottery Clarice Cliff “My Garden” Fluted Vase (8”/20cm, 800g).

Marvellous handcrafted item. In superb condition without any chips or cracks and minimal crazing commensurate with age. Beautiful vase. Would not look out of place in a modern contemporary environment.

Please browse all 12 sets of photographs attached for size, weight and condition as they are self explanatory.

Clarice Cliff was born (1899) into a working class family in Tunstall. She showed artistic promise at school and left at age 13 to work as an apprentice enameller at a local factory 3 years later moving to another firm as an apprentice lithographer, at the same time she attended evening classes at Tunstall School of Art.

In 1916 at 17 she joined A J Wilkinson's pottery where her drawing brought her to the attention of the owner, Colley Shorter and he allowed her to experiment on some old stock. In 1927 he arranged for her to study sculpture at the Royal College of Art in London. Later in 1927 she studied in Paris.

After a few months there she returned to Stoke-on-Trent where Shorter set her up in a decorating studio. By 1929 her designs went into full production as 'Hand Painted Bizarre by Clarice Cliff'. By 1931 she was an Art Director of the factory with a decorating team of around 150. Clarice Cliff and Shorter eventually married. She died in 1972.

Rare combinations of shape and pattern attract very high prices at auction. The world record price for a piece of Clarice Cliff is held by Christie's, South Kensington, London, who sold an 18-inch (460 mm) 'charger' (wall plaque) in the May Avenue pattern for £39,500 in 2004. Shortly after this the same auction house sold an 8-inch (200 mm) vase in Sunspots for £20,000!

A rare Red Autumn shape 369 vase sold for £4900 at Fielding's auctioneers, Stourbridge in the West Midlands, and Woolley and Wallis auctioneers Salisbury sold a 3-inch (76 mm) high miniature vase in Café (used as a salesman's sample in the 1930s) for a staggering £3000.[32] In May 2009 an eighteen-inch charger in the May Avenue pattern sold for £20,500 at Fielding's auctioneers.

In 2009 Will Farmer of the BBC Antiques Roadshow and members of the Clarice Cliff Collectors Club unveiled three plaques. These were on her birthplace, Meir Street, Tunstall, her second home on Edwards Street, Tunstall and the site of Newport Pottery by the canal in Burslem where her Bizarre ware was decorated. These were featured in special Antiques Roadshow programme that December.

In September 2009 the Victoria and Albert Museum in London opened its 'New Ceramics Galleries' and Cliff's work was chosen to be included: "There will be two rooms displaying 20th-century collections. One will show ceramics made in a factory context and will include objects by designers such as Susie Cooper and Clarice Cliff".

The exhibition and the first book published privately in 1976 'Clarice Cliff' by Peter Wentworth-Sheilds and Kay Johnson (L'Odeon publishing) marked the start of a major revival of interest in Cliff's work, which has continued to be sought after by Art Deco ceramic collectors ever since.

Newport Pottery we’re earthenware manufacturers at Newport Lane, Burslem, England. The Newport Pottery Co. Ltd was purchased in 1920 by the Shorter family, owners of the adjacent A. J. Wilkinson Ltd’s Royal Staffordshire Pottery. The pottery was used by its new owners for the manufacture of simple, inexpensive domestic ware and hotelware.

From c.1927, the pottery became the base for the decorating shop and, later, the design studio used by Clarice Cliff to develop ‘Bizarre’ ware and the other shapes and patterns for which she is now well known.

In 1941 the Newport Pottery business was concentrated with that of the other Shorter factories at the Royal Staffordshire Pottery, and the Newport Pottery buildings were diverted to war-time purposes.

The Newport Pottery buildings was demolished shortly after the end of the war and post-1945 the Newport Pottery Co. Ltd operated from the other Shorter factories manufacturing its original domestic ware and hotelware.

Clarice Cliff joined the firm of A. J. Wilkinson as an apprentice lithographer in 1916 and rose to be the head designer. She married the owner of the business, Arthur Colley Shorter in 1940 and was the final owner of the Shorter businesses following the death of her husband in 1961. She was both a modeller of shapes and a pattern designer and, from late-1927 to 1936, her studio at the Newport Pottery produced an almost unbelievable array of novel shapes and patterns.

Remarkably, this enormous creativity was condensed into a relatively short period from the launch of the ‘Bizarre’ range in 1927 to the beginning of the Second World War in 1939.

‘Bizarre’ was the first, most prolific, and longest lasting of the Clarice Cliff ranges, but others followed including Fantasque, Biarritz and others. The ‘Bizarre’ mark introduced in 1927-28 was phased out in 1936 to be replaced by a more general ‘Clarice Cliff’ signature widely used on wares from the Newport and Royal Staffordshire factories.

The period also signalled a change to a more conservative style as the strident patterns and extreme shapes of the period from 1928-1933 were replaced with more sober designs and a softer palette.

Between 1936 and 1939 designs were gradually simplified and Clarice Cliff took a less direct interest in the modelling and decoration.

Post-1945, Wilkinson’s Royal Staffordshire Pottery was modernised and production concentrated on printed ware for the export market. A small hand painting shop was re-established in 1946 and production of some of the most popular Clarice Cliff designs such as Crocus and Rhodanthe continued on a small scale.

Post-1945 many Clarice Cliff shapes and patterns appear with a Royal Staffordshire mark.

In the 1950’s Clarice Cliff worked with the new, younger, modellers and designers employed at A. J. Wilkinson Ltd including Peggy Davis, Eric Grindley and Eric Elliott, even so, the innovation of the 1930’s was never recaptured. Her husband, and effective owner of the business, Arthur Colley Shorter died in 1961 and Clarice Cliff-Shorter subsequently sold A. J. Wilkinson Ltd (including the Newport Pottery Co. Ltd) to W. R. Midwinter Ltd in 1964. Midwinter were, themselves, absorbed by J. & G. Meakin Ltd in 1968 and then by Wedgwood in 1970.

In the 1990s Wedgwood re-issued many of the classic Clarice Cliff shapes and patterns as limited edition collectors’ wares. Manufacture of the reproductions ceased in 2002 and they have since become collectible in their own right.

There are numerous books and web sites devoted to the life of Clarice Cliff and her influence on 20th century English ceramic design.