Tag Archives: Speedwell

Botanic Garden Egg Cups

August 17, 2014 Lia

The original six footed egg cups in the Botanic Garden range were: Heartsease, Speedwell, Rhododendron, Common Tomentil, Scarlet Pimpernel and Forget-me-Not.

The Scarlet Pimpernel occurs in various shades of red.

The Common Tomentil was later replaced by the Yellow Jasmin.

The Rhododendron has two versions, one with an extra butterfly:

The butterfly is on the back, and seems to fill a gap in the motif:

The original Botanic Garden egg cups had a different shape altogether:

Most of my egg cups have the old backstamp:

There are some egg cups about without the leaf border:

The footed egg cups are beautiful and practical, we use them a lot

Miscellaneous

Plant Pots

July 3, 2014 Lia

Botanic Garden always has had a great variety of planters and plant pots. Here are three small pots made for Kew Gardens:

These have the Forget Me Not, the Rhododendron and the Speedwell.

Here are my favourite 4 by 5 inch pots, with the original oatmeal motifs:

Thet are the Ivy Leafed Cyclamen, the Orchid, the Purple Iris, the Canterbury Bells, the Barbados Cotton Flower and the Orange Cactus.

Portmeirion also had boxed planters or cache pots, here seen with the Common Tomentil:

The backside of the box advised which plants they were meant for:

Here is a bell-shaped planter with the Trailing Bindweed:

Although many planters have the Botanic Garden motifs there are also Pomona planters, here seen with the Ingestrie Pippin, the Imperatrice Plum and the Red Currant:

and Birds of Britain planters, such as here with the Nuthatch:

The Spring Gentian can also be found on planters:

Botanic Garden

Portmeirionlore: First Botanic Garden drumshape bowls

June 10, 2014 Lia

In 1973 the first set of dinnerware in the Portmeirion range had several drumshaped dishes or tureens, as well as the Meridian shaped soupbowls. They have the old motifs with dark coloured butterflies.

The low dish in the front of the picture only occurs in the oldest sets, and I have only seen it with the Citrus.

The bowls come with the same motifs as can be seen on the teacups, the lids have the Strawberry Tree and the Yellow Foxglove:

The soup bowls also have the same motifs as the teacups:

The Scarlet Pimpernel, Forget-me-not, Rhododendron, Common Tomentil, Heartsease and Speedwell. The bowls are quite large, therefore large butterflies were added to fill up the empty space on the cups. The bowls came with white saucers with the leafed border.

Three different sizes of jugs were part of the set, the smaller two with the Spring Gentian, the larger also with the teacup motifs:

Spectacular butterflies…………

Botanic Garden, Miscellaneous

Portmeirion Thimbles

May 28, 2014 Lia

In 1985 Portmeirion, commissioned by the Thimble Collectors Club, produced a trial thimble, featuring the Heartsease.
The following year a collection of twelve different Botanic Garden thimbles were made exclusively for the TCC.

The Thimble Collectors Club no longer exists, and it is said that only very few sets of twelve are now known to be in the possession of Portmeirion collectors.

In this set of sixteen you can see: Common Tomentil, Spring Gentian, Red Star, Orchid, Ivy Leafed Cyclamen, Broom (2 versions), Rhododendron, Barbados Cotton Flower, Speedwell (2 versions), Honeysuckle, Forget Me Not, Daisy, Scarlet Pimpernel and Heartsease.