Found, not bought

There is a new trend doing the rounds, and for once it is one I can get properly behind. After years of plain white crockery and beige everything, bold decorative vintage plates are back. Lettuceware, Delft, Ginori, transferware. People are hanging them on walls, leaning them on dressers, and actually putting food on them again.

The good news for those of us who shop second-hand is that charity shops, car boots and Vinted are full of this stuff, often for a couple of pounds. Here is what is what, and where to be a little bit careful.

Lettuceware

This is the green leaf-shaped ware, plates and bowls moulded to look like overlapping lettuce or cabbage leaves. You will know it when you see it. Charity shop shelves are full of it at the moment, and most of it is the cheerful, inexpensive sort, which is exactly what you want for a bit of green on a shelf.

A word of honesty though, because there are two very different things going by the same name. The pieces you will actually find for a few pounds are usually modern or Portuguese leaf ware, lovely and worth buying. The collectable end is a different world. The American “Lettuce Leaf” made by Wannopee was even collected by Jackie Kennedy Onassis, and the hand-made Lettuce Ware by Palm Beach potter Dodie Thayer goes for serious money at auction. You are very unlikely to trip over one of those in your local hospice shop, so buy the green leaf plate on Ebay because you like it, not because you think you have struck gold. Mostly you won’t have, and it doesn’t matter.

Delft

This is the blue and white I am soft for. I have picked up some really nice pieces of Delft on Ebay, and I love it, the deep blue on white never tires me out the way some patterns do.

Here is the bit worth knowing if you want the genuine article rather than a pretty lookalike. Real Delft is hand-painted tin-glazed earthenware, and yes, you should check the bottom, but the markings can mislead you. “Delft” is not a protected word, so all sorts of blue and white gets stamped with it. A crown on the base does not mean royal or original. Words like “hand painted” or “made in Holland” are not a guarantee of anything either. The real tell is the painting itself. Genuine pieces are painted by hand, so the lines have a little human wobble. Cheaper copies are printed, and if you look closely you can often see the faint dot pattern or the lines of a transfer where a brush would have left none.

None of which should put you off. A printed blue and white plate is still a lovely thing on a wall. Just know what you are buying, and pay accordingly.

Ginori

If you want to feel fancy, this is the Italian porcelain. Founded near Florence in 1735 and still going, now under the same roof as Gucci, so it sits at the luxury end. You are less likely to find real Ginori going cheap in a charity shop, but it does turn up, and even the everyday Italian florals in this style are gorgeous. Worth a second look if you ever spot the name on a base.

Transferware

This is the workhorse of the whole trend, and the one filling charity shops up and down the country. Transferware is printed rather than painted. A design was engraved onto copper, printed onto paper, then pressed onto the plate, which is how the Victorians produced beautiful patterned china at a price ordinary people could afford. Think Willow pattern, Spode, all those blue and white scenes you grew up seeing at your nan’s. It is everywhere, it is cheap, and it looks wonderful grouped on a wall.

So in a funny way, transferware is the original affordable lookalike. It was never meant to be precious. That is rather the point of it, and exactly why it suits a second-hand shopper down to the ground.

The honest bit

What I like about this trend is that you genuinely do not have to chase the real thing. A wall of mismatched blue and white plates looks just as good whether every piece is antique hand-painted Delft or a job lot of printed transferware from the charity shop. The look does not care.

And it is a style that never really dates. Whether your home leans modern and pared back or warm and traditional, a good decorative plate seems to find its place. That is unusual for a trend. Most of them look daft within a year. This one has been quietly working for a couple of hundred years already.

So buy what catches your eye, check the base if you want to know what you have got, and don’t pay antique money for a printed plate. Beyond that, fill your boots.

If you find something lovely this weekend, I’d love to see it.

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