Brigadoon cream soup cup

Bone china

Bone china is a type of porcelain body originally developed in the UK in which calcined ox bone, bone ash, is an essential constituent. It is characterised by brilliant whiteness, strength and translucency. brigadoon cream soup cup may be an example of this process.

The initial use of bone ash in ceramics is associated with Thomas Frye in the mid eighteenth century in which he used it to develop a kind of soft-paste porcelain. In As the 18th century drew to a close, Josiah Spode carried on with further developments, and subsequently popularized it, by mixing it with china clay, kaolin and China stone to compete with the imported Oriental porcelain.

The initial basic formula of four parts china stone, three and a half parts china clay, and six parts bone ash still remains the standard English body.

The production of bone china generally employs a 2 stage firing where the first "biscuit" is fired without a glaze at 1280°C (2336°F) giving a semiopaque product and then it is glost, or glaze, fired at a lower setting less than 1080°C (1976°F). brigadoon cream soup cup is probably manufactured using this approach.

Soft-paste porcelain

Soft-paste porcelain is a kind of porcelain and therefore a ceramic material.

Its history dates from the first experiments by potters from Europe to copy Chinese porcelain by employing formulations of china clay and frit or ground-up glass; lime and soapstone were known to have also been included in some compounds. As these early concoctions suffered from high pyroplastic deformation, or slumping in the kiln at raised temperature, it was uneconomical to produce them. Compositions were later produced based on quartz, kaolin, feldspars, nepheline syenite and other feldspathic rocks. These were technically superior and are still in production to this day.

Hard-paste porcelain

Hard-paste porcelain is a hard, dense ceramic that was initially produced from a compound of the feldspathic rock petuntse and kaolin fired at very high temperature. It was first made in China around the 9th century.

The secret of its manufacture was not known in Europe until the early 18th century, when Böttger of Meissen, Germany discovered the formula. Regardless of attempts to keep it secret, the procedure was used by other German ceramic factories and eventually became known throughout the whole of Europe.

Hard-paste porcelain can be fired at a range of temperatures to make many unique end results. Depending on the firing technique, hard-paste porcelain can be made to resemble stoneware or earthenware. Generally however, it is unnecessary to use hard-paste porcelain for these lower temperature ceramics. Hard-paste porcelain can be employed to create porcelain bisque, a hard crystalline product fired at extremely high temperatures in a pressure controlled environment. This method generates a translucid bright white ceramic. Unlike other bisque ceramics, porcelain bisque is almost inpenetrable by water, therefore it becomes unnecessary to glaze the body before painting. Manufacturers such as Hummel, Precious Moments and Lladro employ hard-paste porcelain just for this reason, this could include brigadoon cream soup cup.