Bow porcelain

The Bow porcelain factory (active c. 1747–64 and closed in 1776) was an emulative rival of the Chelsea porcelain factory in the manufacture of early soft-paste porcelain in Great Britain. It was originally located near Bow, in what is now the London Borough of Tower Hamlets, but by 1749 it had moved to 'New Canton', sited east of the River Lea. That new site now forms part of the London Borough of Newham, whose Heritage Service owns and curates a significant collection of items from the factory as well as from archaeological digs there in 1969. The New Canton site was also excavated in 1867 (discovering kiln wasters which were tested by a chemist at the direction of Lady Charlotte Schreiber) whilst another dig occurred in 1921 on the opposite side of the High Street.

Designs imitated imported Chinese and Japanese porcelains and the wares being produced at Chelsea, at the other end of London. Meissen figures were copied, both directly and indirectly through Chelsea. Quality was notoriously uneven; the warm, creamy body of Bow porcelains is glassy and the glaze tends towards ivory.

Early patents applied for by Thomas Frye and his silent partner Edward Heylyn in December 1744 (enrolled 1745) and a totally different patent of 1 November 1748 (enrolled March 1749), both apparently intended broadly to cover the uses of kaolin, do not seem to have resulted in any actual manufacture before about 1749, though Frye's published epitaph claimed he was "the inventor and first manufacturer of porcelain in England." "Heylyn and Frye do not appear to have had a factory of their own, but probably carried on their experiments at a factory already existing at Bow, having first secured the services of a well-skilled workman whose name has not been preserved, and who may have been the real inventor of English porcelain," a writer noted in 1911.

The earliest Bow porcelains are of soft-paste incorporating bone ash, forming a phosphatic body that was a precursor of bone china. By 1749-1750 the business had moved from Bow to 'New Canton', a new factory on the Essex side of the River Lea, close to Bow Bridge, just west of Stratford High Street and beside Bow Back River. This move is evidenced by inkstands at the British Museum and at the Museum of Royal Worcester bearing the year 1750 and the inscription "Made at New Canton". Also by 1750 Frye was serving as manager of the factory, under new owners, John Crowther and Weatherby. In 1753 they were advertising in Birmingham for painters and a modeller. Sources for the early history of the Bow manufactory were collected by Lady Charlotte Guest in memoranda, diaries, and notebooks, including a diary of John Bowcocke, who was employed in the works as a commercial manager and traveller.

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