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Cup and saucer

Manufactory Meissen Manufactory German
Factory director Böttger Period
1717–20
Not on view
The Meissen factory, established outside Dresden in 1710, was the first in Europe to discover the formula for hard-paste porcelain. This coffee cup with saucer is one of the earliest manufactured at Meissen. It is decorated with a metallic luster glaze in the interior of both the cup and the saucer. The gold content of this glaze, which produced the pearly iridescence, made it an expensive type of decoration, underscoring the high status of coffee drinking.

Artwork Details

Object Information
  • Title: Cup and saucer
  • Manufactory: Meissen Manufactory (German, 1710–present)
  • Factory director: Böttger Period (1713–1720)
  • Date: 1717–20
  • Culture: German, Meissen
  • Medium: Hard-paste porcelain
  • Dimensions: Height (cup .83): 2 3/4 in. (7 cm); Diameter (saucer .84): 4 1/2 in. (11.4 cm)
  • Classification: Ceramics-Porcelain
  • Credit Line: Gift of R. Thornton Wilson, in memory of Florence Ellsworth Wilson, 1954
  • Object Number: 54.147.83, .84
  • Curatorial Department: European Sculpture and Decorative Arts

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