Designs for transfer printed pottery mounted in a volume half bound in leather. Most depict naturalistic compositions of flowers, etc., or imaginary landscapes, some with Asian subjects: others are more formal depicting borders derived from Gothic tracery, geometric and Renaissance ornament, etc. c. 1820-c.1880.
The front end-papers are stamped and bear a label lettered A.J. Wilkinson Limited, Royal Staffordshire Pottery, Burslem. Most of the designs are embossed with a blind-stamp ‘James Parr, ‘Ellgreave’, Ellgreave Street, Burslem, Stoke on Trent’ and many are stamped Derby Crown Porcelain Co. Limited. A few are inscribed ‘John Cutts, Pinxton’. The designs are stamped consecutively 000001 to 000735 (000019, 000052, 000093, 000113, 000133, 000188, 000191 and 000238 are missing).
The album was once in the possession of Arthur J. Wilkinson Ltd. (founded in 1885) and was still in use by the firm in 1958. The drawings seem, in addition, to have passed through the hands of James Parr (1870-1947), an engraver for several ceramic firms, including J & C. Meakin, Myott, Son & Co., and Coalport. Through this album he can also perhaps be connected with the Derby Crown Porcelain Co. Ltd., formed in 1876. The earlier history of the drawings is unknown, but they presumably came from several sources. John Cutts (1772-1851) was a ceramic painter at Pinxton and at Wedgwood of Etruria, who after 1816 set up his own business in Hanley.