Question:
Another one to identify - keep you busy for a bit, maybe.... Lashings of underglaze black and gold, with hand applied overglaze red. Sort of paeony pattern. Mark on back won't photograph - a red coronation type crown with what looks like a sparkler on top, and underneath a printed B which is either very seriffed at the foot, of combined with a preceeding J. Plate is 235 mm across, the mark is 9mm from base of letter to top of sparkler. Only other mark is a handwritten gold 30 on the base. All the black bits are outlined with gold, and the leaf veins are gold. (When I say coronation crown, I mean the big velvet lined thing that weighs half a ton that nearly pushed the Queen through the throne, not the open circle with pointy bits.)
Answer:
Well Phil, this is just a shot in the dark because without a picture of the mark I'm not likely to find it. There are a lot of crown marks but I found one with a B under it in a book that I have but no sparkler thing above it. Does the mark on the left of my attachment look anything like it? I included the one on the right to see if that's what you meant what it looked like with a sparkler on top? For the mark on the left the book says, "Derby, Great Britain, Bloor. 1811-1848."
I only have a couple of books on marks to look through but hopefully Elizdale will be back soon, she's out of town. She has a lot of books so maybe she'll be able to help you out more than I.
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Well I guess it would help if I actually attached the attachment. lol
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The crown is the right sort, but mine's neater. The sparkler on top is just like a firework sparkler - a little stick with sparks coming off it, rising up at an angle (to the left). It may be totally accidental, but it doesn't look it. The B is neater than the one you've illustrated, and the projection is really only at the foot. I bought it over 20 years ago, not very expensively, from an antique shop in Hellifield, Yorkshire, or possibly in Ilkley, Yorks. I would have expected them to recognise Bloor Derby. The mark it resembled to me at the time was of a Belgian factory and was listed in a book I can't now find. Obscure enough possibly to be not recognised. However, I later decided that it was unlikely to be from there - for what reason I can't now remember. Schaerbeek, that was it. Crown and B but not mine. Just found a good source of marks - http://www.oldandsold.com/pottery/belgium1.shtml Doesn't help with this one, though... Also just found references to a pottery called Crown B Burslem - all references seem to be on eBay! Not the right mark - and wrong period too. (By the way, how do I edit a post? I need to change 'of combined' to 'or combined' in the original question.)
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When I worked in reprographics, I was once asked to photocopy an Action man, and regularly photocopied (in colour) slices of cake (for Home Economics exams!), but until now I'd never scanned a plate. And here's the mystery mark complete with sparkler.
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That's a tough one.
Definitely in the IMARI flavor. Could also try checking into Gaudy Welsh.
ps not "black" ... actually cobalt blue.
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Never come across Gaudy Welsh before. Thanks for that. Have looked into it, and possible. But can't find any pattern quite like it - they don't seem to have paeonies. It's definitely British or Continental with that mark - and what the heck is that sparkler? I've tried it in a different light - you're right, it's cobalt blue. But it's very dark and appears black in most lights.
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Talking today with someone in the trade. He was rather suspicious in case I was trying to sell it to him (I wasn't - I was selling him Doulton figures!), muttered something about Derby. Actually seemed quite interested in it but didn't want me to know.....
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I once had a super-thin porcelain plate that was very much in the Derby Imari flavor (only nicer than the new stuff IMO).
The mark was a very beautifully hand-painted crown (with little dots along the top of it) and a scripted "B" underneath..or it might have been a "D" - I can't remember! I wish I still had the photo of the mark. It was very much like your mark only much simpler and done with a thin paintbrush. I could NOT find that mark anywhere on the web or books, but I always suspected it was late 18th century-early19thc Derby. It sold but I never bothered to ask the buyer what she knew about it.
:Bang Head: