In the 18th century, large jugs or ewers were used with matching basins during the toilette, never at the dining table. They would have been displayed on a wealthy lady's dressing table and used for washing during the process of dressing, hairdressing and applying make-up. Food was often consumed during this lengthy procedure, making hand washing even more necessary. Ewers and basins were also used in the garde-robe which, for the wealthy in the mid 1700s, was used in the same way as we use a plumbed-in bathroom today. Royal garde-robes or cabinets de toilette were comfortably furnished and often had painted wood panelling and matching accessories such as useful porcelain items.

Rosalind Savill, in her catalogue of Sèvres porcelain in The Wallace Collection (see below), lists the many different items the Sèvres factory made for the toilette: foot-washing bowls, mouth-rinsing bowls, spittoons, bidets, barber's basins, chamber pots, eye-baths, sponge and soap boxes as well as pots for make-up and brush handles for different kinds of powder.

The Vincennes factory had a connection to the French crown from its inception as it was established in 1740 in the semi-abandoned royal fortress of the château de Vincennes to the east of Paris. There, a handful of porcelain specialists were inspired to start experimenting with porcelain as huge prices were paid by wealthy aristocrats for this glassy white substance which had for the most part to be imported from East Asia or the Meissen factory in what is now Germany. It was the Saxon ruler Augustus the Strong who had led the drive in Europe to emulate Chinese porcelains and his factory was established in about 1710. During the early 1740s the majority of the Vincennes factory's products were probably experimental as the porcelain body was still being perfected and different enamel colours were being invented. In 1745 however, they secured a royal 'privilège' which granted them the exclusive right to produce porcelain in Meissen style in France. By the late 1740s their products were already accomplished with a wide range of enamel colours in use, followed from 1748 by gilding and ground colours from 1752 onwards. The factory moved to Sèvres to the south-west of Paris in 1756.

This exquisite ewer and basin are decorated with the special turquoise colour inspired by Chinese porcelains and called bleu celeste at the factory. It was invented and used for the first service Vincennes made, ordered by the King in 1753, probably the same year as these items were made. They bear the crossed Ls of the royal cipher which was adopted as the factory mark around this time, together with the mark of the painter François Binet.

Savill, Rosalind. <u>The Wallace Collection: Catalogue of Sèvres Porcelain</u>, Volume II. London: Trustees of the Wallace Collection, 1988