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In Design: New Life for Old Plates

Posted by Amanda Clarke, September 13, 2007 at 12:45 PM

Fashion plates: A creamer from Esther Derkx, a Cj O'Neill plate, a cup from Joanna Meroz's Crackery collection.

Most of us have at least a few pieces of cracked, chipped, and mismatched tableware that haven’t seen a table in years, languishing in some dark upper cupboard, evidence of life past. But some gifted designers are proving that new life can be coaxed out of such old pieces, yielding functional, provocative works of art, worthy of any table.

For her Improved! collection, Dutch designer Esther Derkx applies muted screen-prints of dancers and athletes to bring quiet dynamism to one-off pieces of vintage floral-print china.

Cj O’Neill energizes thrift-store tableware with bold and bright botanical transfer images in her New Heirlooms range.

And in Joanna Meroz’s beautiful Crackery Tableware collection, thin tendrils adorned with delicate flowers creep out of brilliantly gilded cracks and chips, evoking life through damaged china.

For those interested in rejuvenating their own orphaned and imperfect tableware, try using porcelain paint, which can be cured in your home oven to a durable, dishwasher-safe finish. You can apply the paint using rubber stamps, stencils, or silk screens to create clean, consistent designs, or use brushes and special porcelain paint–filled pens for unique freehand details. For the plate pictured at right, I applied platinum-colored paint through a custom silkscreen on simple tag-sale china.

Read up on properties and usage or purchase Pebeo Porcelaine 150 paint at Blick Art Materials. Check your local art or crafts supply store for paint brushes, rubber stamps, stencils, and custom silk-screen services.

Note: As certain foods react with porcelain paints, causing designs to degrade and discolor, it is best to confine paint application to the outer surfaces of bowls, cups and tea pots, and to the rims of plates and platters (unless the pieces are intended for decorative purposes only).

About the author: Amanda Clarke is a recovering restaurant pastry chef with a background in architecture. She lives in Brooklyn, New York, where she writes, tests, and develops recipes and works on freelance food-styling gigs between walkings and feedings of her two dogs and husband.

2 Comments | Tags: china, crafts, In Design

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