Vintage Rosenthal China

Like a lot of potteries, the Rosenthal Porcelain Factory grew from decorating roots. Founded in 1879 by Philipp Rosenthal, the company did not produce its own forms until 1889, when Rosenthal set up his own ceramics factory in Selb, Bavaria, and quickly hired the best designers and clay modelers he could find. For example, at the beginning of the 20th century, Adolf Oppel designed Art Nouveau figurative pieces at the factory, while Eleonore (Lore) Friedrich-Gronau produced her famous dancers for Rosenthal before and after World War II. Dinnerware, though, would be a Rosenthal mainstay. Between 1904 and 1910, Rosenthal produced its iconic Donatello, Darmstadt, and Isolde dinnerware lines. These plates, bowls, and cups were introduced to the world in unornamented white—only later were they given delicate underglaze designs. Rosenthal’s reputation for figurines and Christmas ornaments notwithstanding, the company’s predilection for pure form over surface decoration has continued to this day. In 1934, Philipp Rosenthal, a Catholic, resigned as his namesake company’s president due to pressures put on him by Adolf Hitler’s Nazi party, which had come to power in Germany the year before and was not enamored with Rosenthal’s Jewish ancestry. Rosenthal died in 1937 and his company would not begin to regain its footing until 1950, when Rosenthal’s son, Philip, joined the firm, eventually rising to run the design department in 1952—later, in 1958, the son would become chairman of his late father’s company. There must have been something about having a Rosenthal at the helm, because the 1950s and ’60s were key decades for the firm. In the 1950s, Philip Rosenthal tapped acclaimed industrial designers Raymond Loewy and Richard Latham to produce modernist dinnerware, and by 1961, a Rosenthal Studio Line was introduced. Although designers would lead the list of individuals participating in the Rosenthal studio system—among them Tapio Wirkkala, Max Weber, and Lisa Larson—the company eventually reached out to fine artists, from Salvador Dali to Andy Warhol, Sandro Chia to Kenny Scharf. Rosenthal also worked with fashion designers Gianni and Donatella Versace, One of the most important aesthetic partners for Rosenthal was architect, designer, and Bauhaus founder Walter Gropius, whose firm, The Architects Collaborative (TAC), designed everything from Rosenthal's porcelain and glass factories to coffee pots and teacups.