Our Collaboration with Berdoulat
Back in the murky depths of lockdown, amid whole lot of home ‘schooling’ and zooming, we started chatting with Patrick and Neri from Berdoulat about them stocking our fine bone china wares in their soon-to-open store in Bath. Many zooms ensued, and we realised that we shared an ethos - making good things properly - and decided that we should really make some good things properly together. It’s been a long time coming - these prototypes were dreamt up back in 2021 and have been gently tweaked and perfected both from a distance and in person since then, fuelled by Neri’s delicious cooking and intermittently distracted by the kids (and a litter of puppies).
The wobbly fruits of our collaboration are a pendant and a ceiling rose both made out of fine bone china in our Devon workshops. They take Berdoulat’s classical references and our own eccentric minimalism to create a pair of beautiful glossy white fine bone china objects designed to work together or alone. The ceiling rose was inspired by a particular favourite French pastry of ours - the inimitable Canelé. Making fine china shapes from classic pâtisserie moulds was no mean feat: the plaster model our moulds are made from was painstakingly carved by hand to allow for shrinkage in the kiln, making the finished rose big enough to be viewed from a slight distance, and importantly to be able to fit over any light fittings and neatly screw in place.
The fine bone china pendant is inspired by antique French ones and is perfectly at home at Berdoulat in Bath, the old general store that has been beautifully restored by Patrick and Neri. The shade takes full advantage of the wonderful qualities of bone china – bright white, opaque and glossy by day, and glowing from within by night. The pendant is cast more finely than our usual wares to ensure the light glows from within, it shares the characteristic wobbly profile with our main collection. It is a tactile delight, with hand-painted accents both on the top of the frill and around the base, to allow it to be hung high or low. We think they look wonderful in sequence above a table.
We’ve absolutely loved developing these objects together with Berdoulat - you really couldn’t ask for design partners with a better eye for detail and fun. Available now on our website and in store at Berdoulat!
Beautiful photos all by Hana Snow
