Perfect Pieces Specialists in British Pottery

Welcome to the first of an occasional series on useful websites focusing on antique and collectable British pottery.

In general, this is a sector quite poorly represented on the internet, so those sites that do offer high quality, authoritative information are worth their weight in bits and bytes.

The website of the Maling Collectors Society is one such site.

The site offers a fairly comprehensive guide to Maling pattern numbers, pattern dates and pottery marks and to the history of the Newcastle-based pottery.

The society themselves have links with several former Maling staff and hold regular Maling Collectors’ Workshops at Charles Allen’s New Castle Delft pottery, which is located on the former Maling pottery site.

If you have already had a look at our own guide to Maling pottery marks and Maling prices and you still have some Maling questions - or would just like to learn more - then I’d recommend you take a look at the society’s website as it is a mine of useful information.

However, if you really would like the ultimate guide to Maling, then it’s a good old-fashioned book that wins the day! Maling: the Trademark of Excellence is a superb and detailed book, written by Stephen Moore and published by the Tyne & Wear Museums Service, from whom the book can also be bought.

Update: Thanks to the Society’s website, I have now disovered that there is a novel available by Tony Boullemier, great-grandson of legendary Maling designer Lucien Boullemier. It’s called Leonie and the Last Napoleon and takes an entertaining and racy look at the history of the family and the events which led to their emigration to the UK.

Perfect Pieces is in the press again - in the current (July/August) issue of Antiques Info magazine with a feature on collecting Maling pottery.

If you’re interested in the Tyneside pottery, then you might want to take a look. The article has a huge selection of photos (with sale prices) taken from Antique Info’s auction result database, as well as useful tips on collecting Maling pottery.

Now is a good time to buy Maling, as prices are generally quite subdued - meaning that even the best 1920s pieces can be picked up for fairly reasonable amounts.