1769-70, BLUE SCEPTRE MARK, IMPRESSED K3, INCISED X TO FOOTRIM

The Japani-sches Tafelservice was used in the Chinese pavilion in the grounds of Sanssouci in Potsdam. The service was ordered between Autumn 1769 and Spring 1770, consisting of 24 place-settings, and as Frederick did not use the pavilion regularly, the service was also used in the palace. The palace itself, Frederick the Great's favourite, was conceived as a small temple to Bacchus, a summer retreat for himself and his most intimate friends, a place for the arts and where they were able to live freely 'without a care', as the name Sanssouci implies. The pavilion was completed in 1764, and Frederick used the central circular hall for intimate dinners. The tops of the windows and doors are decorated with gilded Oriental figures and monkeys, and above the entablature is a domed ceiling painted with Orientals on a balustraded terrace. The cartoon for the dome was provided by the Parisian artist Blaise Nicolas Le Sueur (1716-1783) and it was painted by Thomas Huber (1700-1779). The decoration of Frederick's Japan-isches service echoes the decoration of the building. The Oriental figures at the centres of the plates have much in common with those painted by Huber on the ceiling of the dome. There were two print sources for the Oriental figures on the plates; the engravings by Laurent Cars after François Boucher, and Pillement's The Ladies Amusement: or, Whole Art of Japanning Made Easy published in London in circa 1760. The borders of the plates also echo the borders on the exterior of the pavilion.

See Erich Köllmann, Berliner Porzellan, Brunswick, 1966, Vol. I, pl. 22 for a plate from this service that was subsequently sold in these Rooms, 'A Century of Berlin' sale, 1 May 2002, lot 16. See Erich Köllmann and Margarete Jarchow, Berliner Porzellan, Munich, 1987, Vol. II, fig. 273 for two dessert-plates from this service now in the National Museum of Stockholm.