Antique French Old Paris Porcelain Large Covered Sugar Bowl with Hand-Painted Flowers, Figural Handles and Bird Finial, 19th Century

Description

Among the most charming and practically useful forms in the Old Paris repertoire, the covered sugar bowl — large enough, as this one is, to serve equally as a biscuit box or bonbonnière — represents the Parisian porcelain tradition at its most confidently domestic. This is not a showpiece designed to sit behind glass; it is an object made to live on a table, to be picked up and set down, to be enjoyed in the ordinary course of a well-appointed household. That it has survived nearly two centuries in the condition it presents is a testament both to the quality of its making and to the care it has received.

The form is robust and generous: a broad cylindrical body with a gently waisted profile, set on a low foot ring and surmounted by a domed lid. The handles are applied scrollwork figures — white-glazed, moulded in relief, flanking the body at either side with the kind of three-dimensional flourish that Old Paris makers used to distinguish their better productions from purely functional wares. The lid is topped by a small white porcelain bird finial, perched with its wings slightly raised — a detail that repays close attention and gives the piece a lightness that its solid construction might otherwise belie.

The decoration is hand-painted throughout in the fleurs des Indes tradition that Old Paris adopted from Meissen and made entirely its own: scattered individual flowers — pink roses, blue forget-me-nots, yellow and orange blossoms, green-leafed sprigs — distributed freely across the white ground without a central reserve or framing cartouche. The freedom of the arrangement is part of its appeal; it has the quality of a garden observed rather than designed. Gilt banding at the rim, foot, and lid edge provides formal definition.

Some wear to the gilding is noted, concentrated — as is typical — at the points of most frequent contact: the lid rim and the handle junctions. This is entirely consistent with genuine 19th-century use and is part of the honest biography of a piece that has actually been lived with. The porcelain body and painted decoration are in fine condition.

The dimensions — 17.2 cm tall, 17.8 cm across the handles — make this considerably larger than a standard sugar bowl, and the vendor rightly notes its versatility: it would serve handsomely as a biscuit box, a bonbonnière, or a covered pot-pourri vessel as readily as in its original function.

Height: 17.2 cm

Width (with handles): 17.8 cm

Material: Hard-paste porcelain with hand-painted decoration and gilding

Condition: Good antique condition. Painted decoration fine. Expected gilt wear at contact points.

Mark: None (typical of the period)

Origin: Paris, France, mid-19th century

Style: Empire / Neoclassical