From English scenes of country life in the 1700s to Thanksgiving-themed dishes in the 1800s to the classic blue willow pattern, transferware has a long history. Transferware comes in many shapes and patterns and colors and there’s something at just about every price point. But, the history is as much a part of why collectors love these pieces as the monetary value.
Collector, Nancy Roberts, has been collecting English transferware since 2000, amassing a huge assemblage of thousands of pieces. She built her collection as she was focused on selling, as happens with process of buying and selling. She started to sell transferware as a way to keep her family’s home from being foreclosed on, taking her (at the the time) small collection from a garage sale they were holding and selling the pieces online.
She started out selling on Etsy and now has her own website, Nancy’s Daily Dish.
Roberts’ stores include a garage full of shelves for her many pieces of transferware pottery. And, the collection is on display inside her home as well, with plates on the walls and in china cabinets both.
There are so many colorful pieces, including one that pictures village children holding a baby donkey -“The Pet of the Common”- that she says speak to “very simple times” in the past. We couldn’t have said it any better. See some of her collection in the video below and you might just fall in love with English transferware as well.
