Any other China lovers here ? Table China that is !

Canadian gran 'china' is used here as a generic term to cover everything including bone china, porcelain, earthenware, creamware, pottery etc etc

I like Portmeirion Pomona and have a wide collection mostly bought as seconds but you wouldn’t know. They are gorgeous.

When we got married dh’s firm offered to buy an expensive present. I chose Hammersley Victorian Violets tea service. His company thought a piece of furniture would last longer but I still have it 45 years later. Mind I’ve hardly used it!

I bought a Meakins poppy for every day use. Gone now but I loved it.

My parents wedgewood dark green florentine complete dinner service went to auction, along with lots of other pieces, when my Mum moved into care. None of the family wanted it.
I’m happy with our plain white set that has a subset still boxed and stored in case of breakages, it’s not bone china, nor particularly expensive.

It is pretty tame my lovely but as a table China adorer too, I’m right with you. Vintage is my fav! X

AlasNo you might have thought you’d died and gone to heaven if you’d been in my late MiL’s house last week! We had to clear it for sale and it took us 2 weeks to empty cupboards and display cabinets of all the china she’d kept over the years including her Royal Crown Derby wedding dinner service - she would have been 98 this year. Her family had a china shop in Falkirk and much of the stick seemed to be in her house!
Sadly, most of it including all the makes you mention has gone to auction- McTears in Glasgow this coming week if you’re interested- the china, we are told, will go for a song! Few people want it these days.

I have Wedgwood Stirling dinner and soup plates. Oven to tableware so not fine china. A wedding present 51 years ago and a true 70s colour dark brown.
Sadly they make a very scratchy sound in use so not well used. But well loved.
I also like vintage/retro and have all sorts of interesting pieces as wellmas a collection of 60s Old Hall tea sets. Including the unusual and collectable set whose name has escaped me. Excuse my while I Google . Damn chemo brain

I love china too but I took all my Mum's Noritake, Royal Doulton, etc to the auction rooms and they said it was pretty much worthless. People don't want it because they don't display it like we used to and it isn't dishwasher proof. Sad times.

Old Hall "spaceship" by Robert Welch. Stainless steel and the spaceship Teapot makes the best cup of tea ever. From the 60s. I have the hot water pot jug and sugar bowl. All in frequent use.

Yes! I love good China. I also love good cutlery and glassware.

Like others I have Royal Doulton (Mrs Bucket) dinner and tea service for high days and holidays.

My great grandmother’s on both sides cup and saucer (displayed - not used)

The most beautiful tea service (paragon) inherited from a great aunt.

Other very special limited edition mugs of all variety, which get used regularly.

For every day I use Emma Bridgewater and also I use Rick Stein mugs because they have all the Cornish places I so love and the colour reminds me of the sea in the summer

Emma Bridgewater stuff is both contemporary and old-fashioned (quaint?) all at the same time. I don't think there's any of her designs I dislike.

Our first dinner service, bought in Singapore in 1969, was from New Zealand - all that is left now are two dinner plates, and the soup bowls, one of which is used for the cats' biscuits.

DH's aunty gave us a Meakin Maidstone set as a wedding present, most of which DD has appropriated as she loves it.

Then we bought a cheap Boots service when we were posted to Australia in the 80s, most of which survived being transported twice halfway round the world; some is still in use.

Finally, about 20 years ago we bought a Denby service, Green Leaf, I think it is. We bought a lot of it from the Denby factory shop in Derbyshire; it was a nice day out, to go and choose some more pieces. Of course, it is now discontinued......

I also have a Blue Denmark breakfast set!

And I've just remembered, the thing to have when we lived in Singapore was a Japanese Noritake dinner service, but we didn't succumb.

I'm a vintage blue and white china fan too. Used to spend ages going round charity shops collecting all I could find and even managed to make up sets from odd ones bought in different places. They are used every day. I have 2 Ercol sideboards full of odd plates, part sets etc. I display particularly pretty pieces on the wall in the kitchen and special Spode or various brands on a dresser. When they get dusty I just take them all off and choose another lot from the cupboard. I love the intricate designs and wonder who the artists were. Can't beat a cuppa in a bone china mug though.

I also love blue and white china and have a motley collection. Just before we married in 1961, I bought from a shop in Ealing, Lawleys, a blue (lavender) Spode dinner service. We still have a few pieces left.
A few years ago, whilst travelling around S. Ireland, one of the B and B's had the most beautiful Villeroy and Boch(sp ) blue and white service. I looked it up when we returned home 😲 oh so expensive, so never bought any, but I wish I had.

I love china too. I have Spode Blue Italian in every shape and manifestation and it is a treat to eat and drink from. But I don’t think it is actually porcelain- not that I mind. My DH and I also collect eighteenth century porcelain which is beyond beautiful. We have a lot of lovely Worcester. Sadly, like the so called ‘brown furniture’ (aka antique), it is out of fashion. The price has dropped, it’s true, but that only suggests no one cares for it and it will all disappear.

HelterSkelter1

I have Wedgwood Stirling dinner and soup plates. Oven to tableware so not fine china. A wedding present 51 years ago and a true 70s colour dark brown.
Sadly they make a very scratchy sound in use so not well used. But well loved.
I also like vintage/retro and have all sorts of interesting pieces as wellmas a collection of 60s Old Hall tea sets. Including the unusual and collectable set whose name has escaped me. Excuse my while I Google . Damn chemo brain

I got this too as a wedding present but couldn’t cope with the “scratchy sound” so it went. I now prefer bone china and would love to have my mother’s dinner service but have no idea where it went. I have some of MiL’s which I’m quite happy dust occasionally!

I had a small wedding so not many gifts and certainly no 'list'. So my basic everyday plates etc are white and easily replaced. I had the sad task of disposing of my mother's beloved Royal Worcester collection. It was rarely used. It was very pretty but apart from dishwasher issues it would not have been microwave friendly due to gold rims. It fetched a pathetic amount at auction. As a memento I already had bought two cups, saucers and plates of same but I see them now sitting unused in glass cabinet. And of course who used saucers these days?

I've always loved old china but am now limiting myself to a few nice Losol and Mason's jugs and a couple of pretty cheese dishes.
I've just sold my dinner set to a dealer, I don't have a dining room any longer and (since I now live in a mid-century flat) I knew I'd never use it again. I now have a large spare cupboard which is much more useful!

Pammie1

I love china, and I think a cup of tea tastes totally different drunk out of a china cup. My mum collected Royal Doulton Tumbling Leaves pattern from the early 1970’s on and I’ve inherited a full set which I cherish. It’s lovely creamy coloured translucent china with a delicate pale leaf design and I use it regularly.

My molther collected Tumbling Leaves too, I think she'd had hers since the 60's. She told me that she wanted me to sell it but sadly nobody seemed to want it, not even the replacement china dealers. In the end it all went to the local WI.

I do, I love nice China but I use it everyday and I enjoy and appreciate it. Tea really does taste so much nicer from a bone China mug or, better still, a proper cup and saucer! I have a wedgewood “ Susie Cooper” design dinner service I have had since the 70’s, only the saucer for the gravy boat is missing and I noticed last week, the gravy boat has the beginnings of a crack in it, other than that, all there and used regularly. I have a collection of Royal Doulton “Rondalay” pattern pieces, tea cups, saucers, tea plates and odd sized sandwich and breakfast plates all from a local charity shop where it was being sold ridiculously cheap ( I gave them far more than the asking price!) which are used all the time. Lastly, I have some Paragon (now part of the Royal Doulton group) bone China tea cups, saucers and tea plates in Cherwell pattern. All of this goes in the dishwasher, but having recently discovered the Susie Cooper pieces are collectible now and quite sought after, so I may start hand washing but don’t hold your breath! On the other hand, it has been in the dishwasher on a regular basis for at least the past thirty years without any damage!

Some of my mother's "best" china I use everyday and it goes in the dishwasher despite its gold rim. It's not a complete set and completely worthless moneywise, but I love it and I know she would be so pleased that I am using it all the time.
And happily one daughter likes it too. I do wash it on the shortest setting not the long hot one.

The next grey wet day I shall get out all my collections and give them a wash and maybe use some.

Love scouring antique and charity shop for old real China, especially jugs. My favourite piece though, is a copeland spode strawberry plate, circa 1820, lovely size for a victoria sponge, a family heirloom.

"Alasno", I am similar. I love collecting china too and it is difficult to keep a lot of them since my divorce and having to downsize. It all started when I inherited a set of beautiful antique Willow Patterns from my late mother-in-law. Those huge platters, vegetable tureens and dinner plates etc. I displayed them on a lovely old Welsh Dresser which showed them off brilliantly, the dark wood and the blue & white china, just fabulous. Now I cannot resist Spode Blue Italian!! I display the larger pieces but I do use the dinner plates, coffee/tea cups and saucers regularly. These days I don't hide them away for special occasions, I do use them. What's the point is not using them, I say? I also love those exquisite antique green cabbage leaf plates. I have a few but they are quite difficult to find and are quite expensive. I am still on the lookout for them!

Beautiful collection of Royal Doulton is mine but sadly all carefully stored in a cupboard now as I no longer host large dinner parties. Happy memories indeed......