Family heirloom

Monday
Once again it was a gloomy day and I decided to have an indoor day, doing some jobs, Duolingo and knitting. Looking around for something to blip, I thought of blipping a few items of my Mum’s small Royal Crown Derby China collection, in the Posies design, which I acquired when we were clearing out their house. My brother and sister didn’t have anywhere to put it, but I wanted this connection to my Mum, and I have a corner China cabinet in our dining room to keep it in, together with my Lilliput Lane collection. They’re only small decorative items, and she kept them in a lovely mahogany bureau in her piano room. It had opening doors at the bottom where she kept some of her music collection, a hinge down desk, with storage behind, and a glass fronted cabinet of a couple of shelves on the top. If we’d have been living in England, I’d have taken the bureau as well, if we’d had space, but it wasn’t practical to ship it over here!
I decided to do a bit of research on Royal Crown Derby to accompany my blip.
Royal Crown Derby is one of the few original fine bone china manufacturers that still remains in Britain today, 100% producing in Britain. The history of Royal Crown Derby began some time before 1750, when the Huguenot, Andrew Planche, established the first china works in Derby. King George III recognised the uniqueness of Derby porcelain in 1775 when he granted the factory the rare honour of being able to incorporate a crown into the backstamp. Much later, in 1890, Queen Victoria also gave Crown Derby her seal of approval not only by awarding the royal warrant, but also by granting the title "The Royal Crown Derby Porcelain Company".
In 1964 Royal Crown Derby was acquired by S.Pearson and Son, the Pearson family company, to become part of their Allied English Potteries group. Pearson subsequently bought Royal Doulton. The company was then merged into the larger group.
In the year 2000, Hugh Gibson, a former director of Royal Doulton and member of the Pearson family, led a buy-out of Royal Crown Derby, and once again the firm became an independent and privately owned concern, during the year in which it also celebrates 250 years of manufacture of porcelain in Derby. The company is now owned by Kevin Oakes (former chief executive of both Royal Doulton and Steelite).