Leach Pottery, St. Ives - Standard Ware

When I visited St. Ives in September 2008 I made my usual pilgrimage to the Leach Pottery. It was good to see the new kilns and the place had more of a feel of a working pottery than when it opened earlier in the year. I talked to Lead Potter Jack Doherty who told me that two young potters had recently joined and will be starting work on what is hoped will eventually become a new range of standard ware.

As many of you will know, the old Leach Pottery produced a range standard ware for many years. It was way back in the late 1930s that Bernard and David Leach started work on a range of domestic pots for everyday use. They were made to specific sizes from measured amounts of clay and became known as Leach Pottery Standard Ware. Catalogues were issued and the range stayed in production until Janet Leach decided to stop production after Bernard's death in 1979. Examples of the pots turn up regularly on Ebay and the antique and flea market circuit.

Like many other people I have built up a small collection of pieces and I though it would be interesting to build up an archive of images and with the help of 1946 and 1952 catalogues, show the prices of the pots. I have included a calculated relative value in 2008 for those of you who wonder if 12s 6d was expensive for a milk jug in early post-war times, a note at the bottom of the page explains how these relative values have been calculated.

The 1952 catalogue includes a number of new pots notably the elements of a celadon tea set. A number of other sets made up of combinations of individual standard ware pots were also available. These are shown below the list of individual pots.

I am hoping that some of you will be able to send in images of Standard Ware pots that I can include in this archive.

This page is under development so please chec back later to see what has been added!