Haviland

Haviland Limoges Porcelain For Connoisseurs

Created in 1842 by David Haviland, this iconic brand will seduce the porcelain and craftsmanship lovers. With a large variety of collections - from “heritage” classics to contemporary designs, you can be assured to find the item of your dreams. The Haviland Limoges porcelain brand is more than just a name, it embodies the art of French Luxury.

Haviland Limoges Porcelain: A Fascinating History of Arts and Trade

If Limoges has become the world-famous capital of French porcelain, it's because of Haviland’s passion for the white gold. David Haviland was an American trader who, a few years before moving to France, had a porcelain and ceramic company in New York. His passion for the Limoges porcelain made him move to France where he founded his factory.

Limoges Porcelain trade rapidly exploded and David’s creativity and innovation were celebrated worldwide.  Years later, he had the honor of receiving a gold medal at the Crystal Palace Exhibition, also known as the Great Exhibition of New York. In 1855, he was again rewarded for his successful work and received a silver medal at the universal exhibition in Paris. 

Innovative Techniques and Technologies 

Haviland Limoges Porcelain success was not only due to David’s trade skills and vision, but also to his innovative decorative techniques and technologies. His acquisition of revolutionary machines made him the most renowned French porcelain manufacturer. 

The quality and beauty of their porcelain reached the most prominent characters of their times, and still do today. Many great names have been attracted to the renowned porcelain brand such as Napoleon III’s wife, Empress Eugenie, Prince Rainier of Monaco, President Roosevelt, and many others. 

After more than 175 years, the name continues to charm porcelain lovers and their items can be found in many prestigious palaces and restaurants. Haviland Limoges porcelain has successfully maintained its fine reputation by offering worldwide the finest quality porcelain combined with a pronounced taste for art, beauty, and delicacy.

Sabrina Monte Carlo’s Love for Haviland

Sabrina Monte Carlo aims to offer the finest quality items to fulfill all decorative tastes and desires. This top-selling brand is a great choice for everyday chinaware. We mostly love the following collections :

  • Le bestiaire, 
  • Hollywood, 
  • Infini, 
  • Le Brésil.

As mentioned on their website, “At Haviland, it is the everyday passion that builds the success of the maison, with which we continue to write our legend.” For more decoration inspiration with Sabrina Monte Carlo, take a look at our brands

Our Haviland Limoges Porcelain’ Favorites

Haviland’s timeless innovation and creativity in the field of porcelain has made it one of the most famous porcelain brand. 100% from French craftsmanship, and in the spirit of the ancestral techniques discover their unique collections of porcelain. Let yourself be seduced by their legendary know-how and designs inspired by classic styles or modern art. 

Their unique combination of craftsmanship and modernity allows us to enjoy products of the highest quality and the finest tastes.

Haviland Limoges porcelain: Everything you need to know!

When it comes to the delicate nature and charming floral patterns in china, there is nothing like Haviland Limogesporcelain. The brandhas exhibited hundreds of unique patterns to this date with variations of colors or even blank. With so much variety available, it is a bit of a tough task to identify the original Haviland patterns.

How Haviland came into being?

Well, it all started back in France in 1842 when two brothers, David Haviland and Daniel Haviland, partnered to produce decorated china and sell it in American markets. Initially, they started purchasing whiteware from other Limoges production units and got them decorated from the French artisans. However, in 1865, seeing the ever-increasing demand for the decorated china, Haviland procured their own production facility, where they produced their patent porcelain blanks and hired a local decorating staff who created beautiful features on China. This is how the antique Haviland dishes came into existence, which we cherish today!

In 1892, the two brothers parted their ways. However, in 1941, David bought out his brother's share again to keep his family's stake intact. He again used the original name H & Company. Since 1981, Haviland is a family-owned entity.

Haviland is known as the first company that started decorating china by using decals. Before this invasion, all of the products featured hand-painted patterns only. The art of decals was mostly combined with hand-painted patterns to form a statement. Even now, many collectors search for the hand-painted Haviland dishes and pay a premium price to get one.

It might come as a surprise to you that Haviland has produced more than 20,000 patterns. You may not count place setting in the patterns only, but there are soup tureens, platters, gravy boats along with tea sets, and pitchers in various shapes as well.

Unfortunately, no name was given to the patterns that were introduced before 1962. A famous Haviland specialist, Arlene Schleiger, has alloted numbers to the designs that are preferred by the collectors to buy and sell Haviland artifacts.

We all know Haviland as the prime producer of china patterns. However, it also introduced decorative wares under its banner that are also collector's favorites. You can also count for the dresser trays and beautifully decorated cabinet plates under Haviland's name.

Not only modern collectors keep a taste for the fine Haviland dishes, its patterns were well-respected throughout the United States in the old days as well. According to the Limoges historian Mary Frank Gaston, brides used to prefer Haviland dinnerware sets for their wedding china.

How to identify that you are investing in the original Haviland china?

It won't be wrong to say that the name of Haviland is a true representation of fine white and translucent porcelain. Not to forget that they also deal with hand-painted and air-brushed versions. Seeing the fame that the brandearned, many other crockery manufacturers also came forward and introduced the Haviland-alike patterns in the market. To make sure that you are investing in the right dinnerware, we will decipher the Haviland marks in this section.

The Haviland brothers named the original company as H. & Company. In line with their name, they marked their earlier Haviland dishes H&Co. together with sn L under a line to denote Limoges on the rear side of the china. Later on, they started marking H & Co. L France on their china.

There is something more to the marks. Back in earlier days, the Haviland white blanks were produced in one production unit and the decoration facilities were kept at another unit. So, there used to be more than one mark on the Haviland dishes. Some sets were marked with pattern names while some contained factory marks under the glaze and the design marks over the glaze. Special crockery produced for restaurants, railways, and stores contained special signs on them referring to the case.

Arlene Schleiger is a Haviland enthusiast and has compiled his knowledge in the form of five books. Her work is a great help for collectors in identifying the original Havilandpatterns.

Arlene Schleiger has also identified several problems that one might face while identifying the true Haviland patterns.

  1. On many pieces, the same pattern appears with the same floral design but varies in color only.
  2. The arrangement of the flower patterns also varies. The two plates made with the same pattern will seldom be alike.
  3. Different blanks feature the same pattern. Sometimes, the patterns are accentuated with the golden edges, and some appear plain.
  4. It will be a rare case to find the pattern number stamp on the pieces. The china was occasionally stamped.
  5. However, the stamp of pattern number is usually found on the serving trays.
  6. You need to have an eye for the design to identify the flowers that appear in the patterns. Most of the flowers are painted in pink color. It gets hard to decide which flowers are actually roses or apple blossoms or white roses?
  7. Now how to know which Haviland company produced the china that you have?

These problems are not new ones. The authors herself tackled these problems when she built her interest in Haviland dishes and began her search to seek out the identification secrets.

Methods to identify the Haviland patterns

Well many websites claim to identify the patterns for the collectors. All you have to do is to take the picture of your Haviland collection from different angles and email them to the website experts.

However, the much-trusted source is the books published by Arlene Schleiger. She has published the pattern names along with the pictures in her book.

Look out for the marks on the back of your Haviland china. There will be two marks; one representing the manufacturer and another representing the decorator. Look closely at the design of the pattern. What is the shape of the flowers and leaves? Is there a border or scattered design? It will help you in matching the pattern with the Schleiger number.

All in all, the whole identification task can be time-consuming and frustrating. Once it is done, it will certainly be a great accomplishment.