French Haviland Limoges Plate w Bird Snail Escargot Flying Insects c 1876 - 1889

080914-2/RL-680

I place this French Haviland & Co Limoges plate for sale for the Haviland collectors who collect unusual Haviland transfer patterns. The date of the plate is the 19th century, circa 1876 – 1889.

The plate is 7 7/8 in diameter, so most likely a lunch or breakfast plate. It is the napkin fold blank, with a factory gold design on the folds.

The plate has the factory mark on the underside; however it is missing the factory decorating mark. As you can, the decoration is a factory transfer and it is not hand painted.

The colors are in muted shaded of blue, gray, black and brown. There is a bird perched on a twig eying a snail (escargot) and hovering next to the bird are two insects, perhaps a bumble bee and a butterfly. There is grassy foliage.

I can’t tell if the transfer is one from a series, or one of the times where the factory workers put a mishmash of different transfers onto one dish. I don’t recognize any of the patterns, and I’ve never seen a snail on a Haviland dish before.

The gold trim on the napkin fold and on the edge shows a lot of wear. On the underside of the plate there is a chip on the foot rest, and I point to this flaw with red in two photos. There are a few spots on the face of the plate where there is a yellow color in the glaze.

The green underglaze mark is H&Co underscored by L.