This vase tells a story of local clay, experiment and reinvention. In 1872, Absalom Harris founded his pottery at Wrecclesham, on the Hampshire/Surrey border, in a landscape with deep roots in pottery making. Fragments found around Farnham show that pots had been made there since the Iron Age, through the Roman, medieval and post-medieval periods. By Harris’s day, many small country potteries were closing, but he saw an opportunity, the area still needed practical horticultural, architectural and domestic wares, and Wrecclesham offered the essentials for production: water, wood and several useful clays.
Harris came from a family of potters and learned the trade through relatives. Early setbacks taught him the importance of good clay: at one site, lime in the clay caused pots to blister in the kiln. At Wrecclesham he found better materials and enough space to build workshops, kilns and other structures, many made from his own bricks and tiles.
The pottery’s best-known wares began with a challenge. The artist Miles Birket Foster, who lived nearby at Witley, asked Harris to copy the copper-green glaze on a French vase he owned. After months of trials, Harris succeeded. The experimental pieces proved so popular that green-glazed art pottery became a regular part of the Farnham range.
The Farnham School of Art helped turn these wares into something distinctive. Its Master, renowned painter W. H. Allen, encouraged students to work with local craft traditions, not just painting. His students, many of them women, decorated pottery with lively sgraffito designs inspired by Arts and Crafts, Art Nouveau and Aesthetic styles.
Allen also looked to historic Tudor greenwares in the Victoria and Albert Museum for inspiration. Farnham potters developed green, yellow, brown and blue glazes, while students and independent decorators added designs before the pieces were glazed and fired.
The new art wares helped the pottery survive as demand for traditional country pottery declined. Farnham pieces were sold locally and in London, including through fashionable retailers such as Heal’s and Liberty & Co.
By the early 20th century, other country potteries were also making colourful decorative wares, sometimes in similar glazes. Since early Farnham pieces were not always marked, attribution can be challenging.
With its twin handles and ridged neck, this vase reflects the flowing forms of Art Nouveau. The same shape was made in brown glaze and also appears decorated with daffodils. Farnham art wares remained popular for decades, continuing into the early 1940s.
