A PAIR OF BUFF TERRACOTTA GARDEN URNS, SECOND QUARTER 19TH CENTURY

These urns relate to the output of Austin and Sealey or Mark Henry Blanchard of Lambeth. Felix Austin started making artificial stone in 1828 and established works in New Road, London. Mark Henry Blanchard (1816-92) was apprenticed at the Coade & Sealey Factory in Lambeth in the late 1830s before setting up his own terracotta and stone manufacturing business on the Lambeth Road in 1839. It is probable that Blanchard bought numerous Coade moulds in an 1843 sale, as his earlier work has a similar buff hue to Coade's pieces. By the mid-19th century, Blanchard had become the most important terracotta manufacturer in Britain, supplying many of the architectural ornaments for the V&A and Buckingham Palace, winning a number of prizes at the Great Exhibition of 1851. The second in a series of 'vases executed in white terra-cotta, by Merrs. Doulton & Watt, of Lambeth' which were exhibited at the Great Exhibition of 1851 are also worthy of comparison.