Copeland (William Taylor Copeland)
Other names: Spode (1784), Copeland and Garrett (c.1833-47), W. T. Copeland & Sons (from 1867), late Spode and Spode Ltd (1847-2007), Royal Worcester (2007-8)
Foundation date: 1784
Dissolution date: 2008
Function: Pottery manufacturer
History or description: William Taylor Copeland (1797–1868) came from a family of pottery manufacturers. He took over the family's involvement in the Spode factory and became sole owner of the London business after the death of Josiah Spode in 1827. William Taylor Copeland entered into partnership with Thomas Garrett, manager of the Stoke pottery, in 1833 and the company was then known as Copeland and Garrett. This partnership was dissolved in 1847 and the firm then traded as W. T. Copeland, late Spode. In 1867 his sons joined him in partnership as W. T. Copeland & Sons.
Copeland and Garrett was one of the first companies to produce parian ware, an unglazed white porcelain material suitable for reproducing sculptures on a small scale. Copeland and Garrett had developed the process by about 1845 which they called 'statuary porcelain'. The development of parian ware was closely associated with commissions received from the Art Union of London which wished to make small scale and low cost sculptures available as prizes for its subscribers. The first work to be reproduced in this way was John Gibsons's 'Narcissus' in 1845. Thereafter a parian figurine or statuette was a regular feature in the Art Union's list of prizes until its demise in the early 1900s. Other provincial Art Unions also offered parian statuettes as prizes but it was only the London Art Union which could afford to commission new work. However all the Art Unions did a great deal to promote the new material to a wide audience across Britain and Ireland.
Works
Dates are usually the year a work was exhibited so may differ from date of production.
New entries have been made each time a work was exhibited due to a lack of evidence about the state, medium or edition shown.
Manufactured Beatrice
1860
The work was reissued in 1863
Institutional and Business Connections
Commissioned by Art Union of London
1845 (Circa) - 1900 (Circa)
The Art Union commissioned or bought numerous parian statuettes from Copeland's between these dates
Associated People
Collaborated with Edgar George Papworth Jnr
1860 (Circa) - 1864 (Circa)
Copeland reproduced several of his sculptures in Parian ware, including: 'The Young Emigrant', 'The Young Shrimper', 'Maidenhood' and 'Beatrice'
Directed by Thomas Hassall
See Haggar (1953), p. 26.
Employees included Joseph Durham
Twenty of his works were reproduced by Copeland. See Copeland 'Parian Copeland's Statuary Porcelain' (2007), p. 86, noi dates are given.
Employees included James Farrell
Employed by Copeland. See Copeland 'Parian Copeland's Statuary Porcelain' (2007), p. 87, no dates are given.
Employees included Rowland James Morris
See Copeland 'Parian Copeland's Statuary Porcelain' (2007), no dates are given.
Employees included John Mountford
Worked as a parian figure maker: See Stuart 'People of the Potteries' (1985), p. 161, no dates are given.
Employees included Benjamin Cheverton
Created reproductions of larger sculptures for manufacture in parian ware using his patented reducing machine: see Copeland (2007) p. 86 and Atterbury (1989)
Employees included Giovanni Meli
1840 (Circa)
Worked as a modeller for Copeland. See 'People of the Potteries' (1985), p. 151.
Employees included George Abbott
1850 (Circa) - 1860 (Circa)
Modelled figures for production in Parian; see Atterbury and Batkin 'Dictionary of Minton' (1990), p. 247.
Employees included William Beattie
1850 (Circa) - 1860 (Circa)
Designed models for Parian production: see Atterbury and Batkin 'Dictionary of Minton' (1990), p. 250.
Employees included William Henry Goss
1857 (Circa) - 1858 (Circa)
Chief artist at Copeland: see Stuart 'People of the Potteries' (1985), p. 106.
Employees included Arthur Spode Birks
1872 (Presumed) - 1898 (Presumed)
Became head modeller from 1878 [see Copeland, 'Parian Copeland's Statuary Porcelain' (2007), p. 85; see also Wilkinson, 'Ceramic Artists' (2007), p. 30].
Employees included Thomas Barlow
1935 - 1974
See Vega Wilkinson, ‘Spode-Copeland-Spode' (2002), p. 200.
Employees included Thomas Battam
1935 - 1864
Became Art Superintendent at Copeland: Vega Wilkinson, ‘Spode-Copeland-Spode' (2002), p. 201.
Descriptions of Business or Institution
Listed in History, Gazetteer, and Directory of Staffordshire, 1851 White's Trades Directories
1851
Listed under 'China and Earthenware Manufacturers; Porcelain and Statuary'.
Sources
A Century of Art Education in the Potteries. With notes on the Artists, 1953 Local Studies
1953 (Circa)
p. 26.
History, Gazetteer, and Directory of Staffordshire, 1851 White's Trades Directories
21 July 1851
p. 240.
Oxford Dictionary of National Biography
2004
R. E. Graves, ‘Copeland, William Taylor (1797–1868)’, rev. Helen L. Phillips, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004 [http://www.oxforddnb.com/view/article/6260, accessed 3 Sept 2010]
Pottery Company Newscuttings, c.1949-present Stoke Local Archives Collection
See various articles dating from 1949 to 1951 in the index to the newscuttings collection under 'Copeland, W. T. and Son Ltd.' [summary].
The Parian Phenomenon: A Survey of Victorian Parian Porcelain Statuary and Busts
1989
pp. 26-39
Citing this record
'Copeland (William Taylor Copeland)', Mapping the Practice and Profession of Sculpture in Britain and Ireland 1851-1951, University of Glasgow History of Art and HATII, online database 2011 [http://sculpture.gla.ac.uk/view/organization.php?id=msib4_1222085872, accessed 24 Sep 2023]
