Vintage Noritake Hand-Painted Trinket Box | Blue Porcelain Landscape with Gilt Border

Shop > Japanese Pottery and Ceramics

Product: 8455539
  • Product: 8455539
  • Product: 8455539
  • Product: 8455539
  • Product: 8455539
  • Product: 8455539

  • Vintage Noritake Hand-Painted Trinket Box | Blue Porcelain Landscape with Gilt Border

  • £24.00

:  at  £24.00  each

A SMALL PIECE OF JAPANESE PORCELAIN HISTORY This beautiful little Noritake trinket box is one of those pieces whose story is far larger than its size. Measuring just 7 cm wide and 5 cm high, it has been hand painted with a tranquil waterside landscape of trees, reeds, distant hills and water, framed by an elaborate gilt border. The rich blue ground gives the tiny landscape the appearance of a miniature painting set into the lid. Turn it over and the history becomes even more interesting. The base carries a Noritake mark together with “MADE IN JAPAN”, identifying it as a piece produced for the export market. THE NORITAKE STORY Noritake's beginnings stretch back to 1876, when Ichizaemon Morimura established the trading company Morimura Gumi in Japan and sent his brother Toyo to New York, where the brothers began selling Japanese goods to an American market fascinated by objects arriving from Japan. Porcelain soon became an increasingly important part of that trade. After seeing the exquisitely decorated European porcelain displayed at the Paris Exposition in 1889, the Morimura business became determined that similarly sophisticated Western-style porcelain could be produced in Japan. The company went much further than simply copying European wares. Designs were developed specifically with Western customers in mind, while skilled Japanese decorators adapted their extraordinary tradition of hand painting and gilding to the fashionable European and American tastes of the period. In 1895 Morimura Brothers established a design department in New York. Designs influenced by contemporary Western fashions and movements including Art Nouveau were sent back to Japan, where they were interpreted by Japanese decorators. This extraordinary meeting of East and West produced the decorative porcelain now enthusiastically collected as Old Noritake. In 1904 Nippon Toki was established at Noritake, near Nagoya, laying the foundations of the company we know today as Noritake. By the early decades of the twentieth century, Noritake porcelain was travelling across the world. Many pieces were extensively hand decorated and embellished with gold, creating decorative objects that were recognisably Japanese in craftsmanship but deliberately designed for fashionable Western homes. THIS PIECE This little covered box belongs to that fascinating tradition of Japanese decorative export porcelain. Its appeal lies in the detail. The landscape has been painted on a remarkably small scale, with trees in the foreground leading the eye towards still water and hazy distant hills. Around it sits a broad band of intricate gilded decoration, all set against the deep blue porcelain body. It was a decorative object intended to be enjoyed – perhaps sitting on a dressing table holding rings, earrings or another tiny personal treasure. More than simply a useful box, today it represents a period when Japanese manufacturers were establishing themselves internationally and combining Japanese craftsmanship with designs created specifically for customers thousands of miles away. MEASUREMENTS Approximately 7 cm wide Approximately 5 cm high MAKER Noritake Made in Japan Hand-painted porcelain with gilt decoration. CONDITION Considering its age, this charming little box has survived remarkably well. There are no chips or cracks. There are some scratches and areas of wear to the painted decoration, together with some rubbing and loss to the gilding. This is entirely consistent with a small decorative piece that has been handled and used over many years. I have deliberately not tried to disguise these signs of age. Please study the photographs carefully, as they form an important part of the condition description. For me, that gentle wear is part of its story: this is not a modern reproduction pretending to be old, but a little object that has already lived a life. A beautiful small piece of Noritake – and a tangible survivor from the remarkable period when Japanese porcelain was finding its way into homes across Europe and America. Carefully packed by So Nearly Missed for the next chapter of its journey.