My Father's Journal: "Laurel Love"

Laurel Love

 

By Ken Muir

 

For more than fifteen years I avidly chased pieces in the Roseville “Laurel” line.  Some explanation is needed.

 

Laurel pots, the group of eleven pots which once sat on shelves in our house, originated in 1934 during the depths of the Great Depression.  Since money was scarce for most Americans, the line is a small one, comprising only thirteen pieces that first year.  It occurred to me at some point that I might eventually seek out the entire line.  But some pieces remained very hard to find and I eventually gave up that quest. At the end our collection came to represent about $6,000 in retail value during the height of the market years, around 2005.  Fortunately we did not have to invest that much.

 

This aesthetic passion of mine was kicked off by finding a six-inch vase at the Metrolina Antique Show being sold for $100 by an elderly dealer from South Carolina. This was in about 1998, and the quest for additional pieces soon began.

 

What drew me to this particular pattern?  Well, it just “checked all my boxes.” Ever since the 1980s, green pottery had held a special appeal for me, and Laurel’s earthy green tones called out.  Its other earth tones, brown and berry red, also appealed.  The pieces went well with the brown vintage furniture that we loved, and especially with oak, my personal favorite.  Also, its low-sheen glaze was eye-catching.

 

Historically, Laurel fits into an interesting niche in American aesthetics. Its leafy green over-all appearance, highlighted by brown twigs and red berries, recalled strongly the Arts and Crafts Movement earlier in the century. But its molded-in straight lines and “shouldered” handles were a strong connection to the Art Deco Movement, all the rage in America at the time of its manufacture. Thus, the line connected two of my favorite eras in American art history.

 

While we were lucky enough to find most pieces on eBay, a few had to be chased down across the Eastern Seaboard. My first large piece, the ten-inch vase at lower left of group, required a drive through the bowels of the York-Reading area of Pennsylvania to an antique store on Route 9 in the Jersey Shore region. The six-inch rounded vase, (right side, three shelves up) was found at the Hillsville, VA antique market. None were found at private estate sales, as Laurel has always been a relatively rare pattern. It is ranked in the upper mid-range of Roseville patterns by price, and comes in three color waves: green, yellow, and black, and dusty pink.  The green is by far the prettiest and the most sought after.

 

My “Laurel whopper story” is recalling an eBay auction, in 2005, of the largest piece in the line, the 14” vase that we have on the bottom row, center.  In frenzied bidding it went for $2700 that day. Ours, a Christmas present to myself a couple years after the “great recession,” cost less than half that amount.  It is identical to that one,  a perfect piece.

 

So, that’s my story of the “love of Laurel.” 

 

In the panoply of life’s sins, this lust of mine is not among the great evils.