For each of the major West German Pottery manufacturers, he’s compiled a gallery of all of the pieces we have ever owned or sold and placed them into number order. As we find more and more, the galleries will be updated. This allows any collector to quickly skim through and identify a pot. It’s not as all-encompassing as the Pottery and Glass forum, for example, but it is an excellent reference point for the burgeoning collector. We both use it ourselves when trying to identify our own pottery!

Other features are tips and hints on how to identify the different factories; histories of the major factories; and a blog based around West German pottery price trends, where it’s been spotted and so on.

The blog covers the average price trends of WGP, which can be really useful if you’re deciding whether to keep or sell a piece!

If you need any help or information, visit Potsandpots.com and leave Aidan a comment. Alternatively, email him at: info (at) potsandpots.com.

We’re heading off to Germany again in a couple of weeks’ time, so expect an influx of pottery posts both on here and over there.

Our moving date!

We’ve finally had the news we’ve been waiting for, for what seems like months: the completion date for our new house. It’s a week on Tuesday! So, this weekend, we’ve started packing the house. As a couple of friends of ours are going to be renting our old house, we need to get ourselves out fairly sharpish after the completion date in order to let them move in. Unfortunately, needing to pack and wanting to do it are two completely different things…

Vintage west german pottery lamp and other junk!

Aidan's face

Aidan’s face was pretty much like that for the whole time! I’m really not sure what was up with us – laziness combined with apathy and feeling a little overwhelmed by the task, perhaps?

Still Aidan's face...

Pecker Pecker is in the bedroom, so she was safe. Still seemed to find the time to do impressions of Aidan though.

At the moment, the things we’re packing are our familiar objects and old friends. It does seem strange to be wrapping and putting away objects that have sat around us for months, if not years.

Keepers!

The Anglia pottery deer and yet another retro calendar have sat on our computer desk for at least three years. Hopefully, they’ll find a  little spot in the new house.

We were trying to sort things out into three piles: Ebay, car boot sale and to keep. We may have come to some fisticuffs over the labelling of boxes: I was going for a simple and time-saving ‘E’ ‘CB’ and ‘K’ system while Aidan insisted on writing the whole word out.

I won.

Tomorrow, the plan is… well, who knows? We’ve both avoided talking about it! I’ve got a driving lesson and a date with the gym lined up anyway, so that’ll be my excuse for not wanting to do anything. I wonder how much it would be to pay someone to pack for us? It would need to be someone with steady hands and lots of patience to wrap up all of our West German Pottery! If anyone has any packing tips to make it less painful, please do let me know.

Just because it makes me smile, here’s another picture of Aidan’s ‘packing faces’:

"Oy! Stop taking pictures and help!"

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"Adele Martin sends you off into the blue-gold tropics..."

"Natlynn JR's snapshot sheaths..."

 The Hotel Embajador Intercontinental in Ciudad Trujillo appears to be still there. Deja Vu Collectors has got a postcard from the era of the hotel:

Hotel Embajador Intercontinental postcard from Deja Vu Collectors

"Diamond Deb wraps you in the gentle warmth of pure cashmere..."

 The Hotel Jaragua Intercontinental doesn’t appear to have any modern mentions. However, I did find these old graphics for the hotel on a website called delcampe.net:

"Loomtog's sun-worshippers in Peter Pan flower-printed cottons..."

"Majestic's tropical weight separates... the sporting thing to wear..."

"Ready to take in the sights on the island..."

 Vintage luggage labels for the Hotel Curacao Intercontinental in the Netherlands Antilles are availabe for sale on Ebay here:

 Best & Co. was originally a baby and children’s retailer, founded in 1879 in New York City by Albert Best. Originally known as the Lilliputian Bazaar, it later changed its name and expanded to women’s clothing and accessories. According to Wikipedia:

“The flagship was located originally in the “Ladies’ Mile” near Sixth Avenue and 23rd Street. In 1908, Best & Co. purchased for $500,000 the former Engineer’s Club at 372 Fifth Avenue at 35th Street for a new store, joining an elite group of merchants to locate in that section of Fifth Avenue in the early 1900s, including B. Altman, Gorham, and Tiffany’s. This limestone building later became the Bond Clothing Stores flagship when Best moved farther up the avenue, and was later converted to apartments.^[3] Its final 12-story flagship store was located at Fifth Avenue and 51st Street, next to St. Patrick’s Cathedral. (It can be seen in the movie The Godfather…it’s where Michael and Kay have shopped just before seeing the Don has been shot). It was acquired by the company in 1944, from the Union Club. After it closed in late-1970, the beautiful white marble building was torn down and the Olympic Tower was built in its place.”

All of these adverts come from a 1958 January edition of the American ‘Glamour’ magazine – not to be confused with the modern-day, British version. What I love about these adverts is just how redolent they are of a previous era: the illustrations, the fashion, the designs of the hotel, the descriptions of the clothes… all create the perfect ‘mid-century’ image that many people nowadays strive for.

Ladybird Book Cinderella 1964 – Front Cover

Ladybird Books remind me of some of the happiest times of my childhood. Since an early age, I have been an avid reader; anything I can lay my hands on that can be read will be read. Much of this love of reading undoubtedly comes from the Ladybird Books my mum bought me as a youngster. Each week, I was allowed to buy a new book as a treat if I’d been good (I always was…!). My face in finding a new one I wanted to read was probably very similar to this:

Ladybird Book Cinderella 1964 - Cinders finds the pumpkin for her coach

 I actually didn’t have this edition of ‘Cinderella’ as a child: I had the more modern version. But I do remember poring over the details of Cinderella’s dresses, wishing that I could wear one of them.

Ladybird Book Cinderella 1964 – The Mouse Footman

More recently, I seem to have seen some of the 1964 illustrations by Eric Winter popping up in various places. I bought a postcard featuring one of the pictures from Wowie Zowie a couple of months ago for the wall in my classroom. Since then, I’ve been thinking about the Cinderella pictures on and off, debating with myself whether to buy my own copy or not.

Ladybird Book Cinderella 1964 – Her first dress

Last week I found a copy in George Street Books in Glossop and have thought about it all week… I’m so glad that I decided to get it. The illustrations are exquisite! I’ve now got grand intentions of enlarging a few and using them for displays at work, or even to frame some up for our new house. They might have to go into ‘my’ room though – I can’t imagine Aidan will like them!

Ladybird Book Cinderella 1964 - The dress finale!

 ’Cinderella’ forms part of the series of ‘Well Loved Tales’, published by Ladybird Books between 1964 and the 1980s. The earlier editions, up until the 28th book ‘Tom Thumb’ were illustrated by Eric Winter, Robert Lumley and Capaldi. This edition of ’Cinderella’ was written by Vera Southgate. Much more information can be found out at TheWeeWeb: a site devoted to Ladybird Books.

Click to view slideshow.

Thank you to everyone in our family who gave us something for Christmas presents. I always love giving presents, and it’s just lovely to receive so many ones that are personal to us.

Happy New Year Everybody courtesy of Today's Inspiration.com

Happy New Year to all of my loyal and dedicated readers! Many thanks for making 2011 my most successful year on Little Owl Ski.

One of the nice functions of WordPress is the yearly review they send to us. This year, it appears to have had a face lift:

Here’s an excerpt:

The concert hall at the Syndey Opera House holds 2,700 people. This blog was viewed about 49,000 times in 2011. If it were a concert at Sydney Opera House, it would take about 18 sold-out performances for that many people to see it.

Click here to see the complete report.

Some of my personal highlights of last year in blogging world were:

• Interviewing Kevin Graham on his massive contribution to the West German Pottery field
• Visiting the More than Fat Lava Exhibition in Amsterdam
• Being interviewed at the Exhibition and subsequently featured (albeit minutely!) in the Dutch Flow Magazine
• Being interviewed and featured on the fantastic Obsessionistas website

Here’s hoping that 2012 brings many more!

Woman's Own December 11th 1952

Woman's Own December 18th 1952

Woman's Own December 25th 1952

Woman's Own November 24th 1955

 There are so many gorgeous images in these Christmas specials that I just can’t show them all. I took nearly a hundred pictures! So, I will choose my favourites to wish you all Merry Christmas with. Huge thanks and best wishes to everyone who has followed my blog over the last few years. I hope these pictures help get you into the festive mood for tomorrow.

The advertisers of the 1950s seemed to promote a ‘fake realism’ quite strongly. By that I mean, that each image seems intended to portray a realistic lifestyle want or need but quite often in a fake-looking way. Christmas seems to give them an excuse to release some imaginative advertisements; yet for some of them, I can’t help but feel it’s an excuse to ‘bung’ on a few Christmas graphics and see how it sells:

Just what I've always wanted...

Vintage Kleenex Advert

1950s Rowntrees Fruit Gums advert

 This next advert was a very pleasant surprise when I was searching the magazines this morning. As a child, Enid Blyton was my absolute favourite author. I have very many happy memories of sitting reading The Famous Five, The Naughtiest Girl, The Enchanted Tree, Malory Towers, The Magic Wishing Chair and many, many more of her books.

This year, I had to go to my parents on my own, as Aidan was in Australia with work. I would call him a lucky so-and-so but not after seeing the state he’s been in since he got back! Anyway, this meant that I couldn’t physically carry all of my presents from my parents back home. So I brought just one:

Retro Owl Ornament

Not only is this the cutest piece of owl paraphenalia that I’ve seen in a long time, it has another feature that just adds to the kitschy cuteness:

Detachable baby owl!

It’s a detachable, pottery, baby owl!  So, not only is this a decorative item but, if you are that kind of person, you can take out the tiny baby owl and hold it for a bit. Or hide it in unexpected places. Not that I would do any of those things of course…

Our house is fairly Christmassed up this year. We do have a stack of stuff that we roll out each year. My mum has been watching Kirsty’s Homemade Britain and made us one of these to add to the decorations:

Hanging hearts decoration

My picture doesn’t really do it justice, but it does look lovely hanging in the window. Aidan has also made us a wreath for the door, I’ve made a strange Christmas tree shape from a magazine like this, and I’ve half made some bird baubles like this. However, I’ve forgotten to take pictures of those. I do have a picture of the tree though:

Christmas tree!

We did our usual trick of getting it cheap from the German market in Manchester and just hoping for the best. Last year, we had a double-trunker (or a Siamese Tree); this year it’s just a very, very odd, tall, sparse, thick-then-thin shape. We’ve still bunged on all of the baubles though. Hang on, when I say we, what I actually mean is Aidan. I was out on work Christmas do. Less said the better…

We’ve also put the West German pottery to good use:

West German Pottery decorations

The stars came from a window display when I worked at Monsoon in Manchester (boo, hiss!); they were being thrown away so I ‘rescued’ them. You can see a few of our cards here too. We’ve had so many this year! Mainly because I now have a Year Seven form so received lots of misspelled cards from them. The best one was from a little lad who had stuck one of his old primary school photos on the inside of it (“I had to cut D— and L—- out so it would fit just me!”).

More West German Pottery displays

Last but definitely not least on the handmade front… Aidan made me an advent calendar for the second year running. Once again it featured one of the fantastic Christmas images from the Galaxy magazines:

Handmade Advent Calendar

Today, I’ve got plans to: wrap Aidan’s presents, make his card, plan the veggie Christmas dinner, make a friendship bracelet as a present for someone, go to the gym, meet one friend for coffee, meet another for a hot toddy, meet Aidan for a pint once he’s finished work… It’s not all going to happen is it?

Obsessionistas is a beautiful website run by Helen and Graham Powell. They feature quirky and interesting collections by people from all different walks of life. Some of my favourite collections they have featured in the past include air stewardess uniforms, harmonicas, West German pottery, brooches and post-modern design.

Once again, huge thanks from me to Helen and Graham for asking me to be a part of it; I feel very privileged. Here are some of the covers from my collection they featured:

www.obsessionistas.co.uk

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This year, I’ve not asked for any particular pieces of pottery; mainly because we have so much already. Obviously, I wouldn’t turn my nose up at a Scheurich 414 or a Carstens Ankara piece…

If you’re interested in finding out more about West German Pottery, my partner, Aidan, has been working very hard on a website called Potsandpots.com. It’s definitely worth having a look. I know I’m biased, but I do think it’s rather good!

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