Bathroom Ceramics

In the twenty-first century, most civilised communities enjoy washing water 'on tap' as the expected norm. This book traces the history of bathrooms over four thousand years and describes the development of ceramic fixtures for washing and bathing. Ceramic washbasins of the kind we are now accustomed to date only from the late nineteenth century, but for many centuries simple wash bowls have been made by potters for their local communities. Staffordshire potters started making washing and WC bowls, together with other domestic pottery, in the late eighteenth century. By the 1850s, not only had the market for ceramic bathroom fixtures increased but larger and more complex patterns were demanded. Simple bowls were extended to include integral shelf space with soap trays, tap holes, overflows and upstands around the bowls. Changing styles of design and decoration are followed through classical, Art Nouveau, Art Deco, self-coloured ware, the Victorian revival and into the twenty-first century.
This progression is illustrated with colourful catalogue pages, diagrammatic drawings, photographs of historic baths, bidets and washbasins and archive pictures showing production environments of the early twentieth century.