'The fact that in Europe china is called china says it all.'
Dan Cruickshank

Europeans were first acquainted with Chinese porcelain as a result of the importing activities of the Dutch East India Company during the seventeenth century. Porcelain and its manufacture fascinated people. They admired not only its beautifully sophisticated simplicity but also its usefulness due to its being robust and water-tight.

Secrecy and mystery surrounded the magical transformation of clay by fire into transparent porcelain, the production of which had reached a peak of excellence in China over a thousand years ago. A widespread search was undertaken across Europe for the necessary raw materials, but it would take until the mid-eighteenth century for Europeans to successfully manufacture porcelain for themselves.

	Porcelain dish, Chinese. Ming Dynasty, from the reign of Emperor Wanli, 1573-1620.

This particular type of ware is referred to as Kraak porcelain and is named after the Portuguese ships called carracks in which it was transported to Europe. It was the first Chinese export ware to arrive in large quantities.

	Soft-paste porcelain bowl, Worcester, c1785.

This pattern can be found on every possible shape made at the Worcester factory and was produced for many years. It takes its name, The Royal Lily, from an order placed with the factory by George III in 1788, when he purchased a complete service decorated with the Lily design. Several other rival factories also used the pattern.

'The mere chink of cups and saucers tunes the mind to happy repose.'
George Gissing

Like the Chinese, Europeans initially preferred porcelain with blue and white decoration. When the first porcelain was successfully developed in England its decoration was often in deliberate imitation of Chinese blue and white. This wasn't merely due to its popularity, it was easier and cheaper to produce than coloured wares, and required only one firing.

By the mid eighteenth century polychrome enamel painting became more fashionable than blue and white, both in Europe and China. Nevertheless England became and remained a stronghold of blue and white production. English blue and white was the among the first mass-marketed product of the industrial revolution and was made for daily use, its popularity partly stemming from the growing English habit of drinking tea.

	Soft-paste porcelain teapot, Worcester, c1780.

Decorated with an underglaze blue transfer print known as The Fisherman and Cormorant, a design popular at this time with factories such as Worcester and Caughley.

It was during the latter half of the eighteenth century that true hard-paste porcelain was successfully manufactured in England, but even then by only three factories: initially in Plymouth, shortly afterwards in Bristol, then at New Hall in Staffordshire. Its production was continuously refined however, particularly by Josiah Spode, who added calcinated bone. This bone-china was to become the basic formula for china made by generations of potters ever since, and remains the standard for present-day manufacture.

	Porcelain coffee can, New Hall, c1780.

This true, or hard-paste, porcelain piece has an underglaze-blue transfer-printed design on the Willow Pattern theme. It features a large house with bamboo fencing looking like rows of trench mortars.