Thomas Pardoe

Thomas Pardoe (3 July 1770 – 1823) was a British enameler noted for flower painting.[1]

For the English boxer, see Thomas Pardoe (boxer).
Self portrait (c. 1810-1820)

Pardoe was born in Derby on 3 July 1770 and was apprenticed at the Derby (Nottingham Road) porcelain factory in the 1780s, later moving to Worcester. He painted creamware at Swansea between 1795 and 1809, coming under the influence of potter and botanist Lewis Weston Dillwyn, and working together with William Weston Young.[2] The following addresses are listed for him in the Bristol directories: Under the Bank (1809–11); 28 Bath Street (1812–16), and Thomas Street (1820–22).

In Bristol he was an independent decorator and gilder, painting china and pottery supplied in the white by John Rose of Coalport and possibly others.[3] His Bristol pieces are the only ones he signed e.g., "Pardoe Bristol". I assume that only the signatures that include the word "fecit" are ones he decorated, other inscriptions simply indicating retailing. According to Pountney the enamel was fired at the Temple Pottery.[4] He also worked on glass, as the directory listing for 1813 describe him as a "China and glass enameler and gilder, wholesale and retail". He also retailed pieces decorated at John Rose's factory, and probably from the rival Coalport factory operated by John's brother Thomas. Pardoe is particularly associated with botanical scenes.[5][6]

He went to Nantgarw in 1821 at the invitation of William Weston Young, and died in 1823. He is buried in Eglwysilan Churchyard, S.E. of Pontypridd in South Wales.[7][8] His sketch book is now in the V&A Museum.[9]

In 1833 William Henry Pardoe, son of Thomas Pardoe, took over Nantgarw Pottery and began manufacturing stoneware bottles and brown glazed earthenware known as Rockingham pottery. He also began manufacturing clay tobacco pipes, many of which were exported to Ireland. The business continued under Pardoe's descendants, and at its peak produced around 10,000 pipes a week, until its closure in 1920, when cigarettes replaced such clay pipes.

Gravestone in St Ilan's churchyard, Eglwysilan

References
  1. 'The Pardoe Family', Nantgarw Chinaworks webpage.
  2. 'Ch. 4: Thomas Pardoe', in H.G.M. Edwards, Porcelain to Silica Bricks: The Extreme Ceramics of William Weston Young (1776-1847) (Springer Nature Switzerland, Cham, Switzerland 2019), pp. 59-66 (Google).
  3. M.F. Messenger, Coalport 1795-1926: An Introduction to the History and Porcelains of John Rose and Company (Antique Collectors Club 1995), pp. 129-32.
  4. W.J. Pountney, Old Bristol Potteries (J.W. Arrowsmith Ltd., Bristol 1920), pp. 115-16 (Internet Archive).
  5. R. Williams, Nantgarw Porcelain 1813-1822, Inaugural lecture given to the Friends of Nantgarw China Works Museum (GPS Printers, Taff's Well, Pontypridd, 1993).
  6. H. Owen, Two Centuries of Ceramic Art in Bristol (Bell and Daldy, London 1873),pp. 356-57 (Google).
  7. W. Turner, The Ceramics of Swansea and Nantgarw: A History of the Factories (Bemrose and Sons, Ltd., London 1897), passim (Internet Archive).
  8. H.G.M. Edwards, Swansea and Nantgarw Porcelains: A Scientific Reappraisal (Springer International Publishing, Cham, Switzerland 2017), pp. 144-46 (Google).
  9. (Thomas Pardoe's Sketch Book), in J.P. Briscoe and F. Murray (ed.), Notts. and Derbyshire Notes and Queries, V (1897), pp. 113-16.
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