Marked with a “Beehive” symbol indicating Royal Vienna porcelain
Royal Vienna was founded in 1718 by Claudius du Paquier. He had attempted to make porcelain as early as 1716 but did not succeed until he had help from ex-Meissen employees around 1718. He had financial difficulties during the entire time and in 1744 sold the factory to the state. He remained director but retired shortly thereafter. Porcelain of the du Paquier period (1718-1744) is very sought after. The pieces from this period are always unmarked which doesn’t make it easy to find and figure out. For a short time afterwards porcelain pieces were marked with the impressed shield until the well known blue beehive / shield mark was being used. Royal Vienna gave Meissen some good competition throughout their existence. Hoerold worked for them before going to Meissen and becoming one of the most famous painters of porcelain. The second period of Royal Vienna is from 1744-1784. All pieces from this period are marked with the blue underglaze shield. Johann Josef Niedermeyer was master modeller during this time. Financial difficulties continued for the factory and again it was put up for sale in 1784. Nobody wanted to buy it but they hired a new director – Konrad Sorgenthal. This is the beginning of the third period. He turned the factory around by making products of superb quality. Some of these one would think to be modern by style but they were made almost 200 years ago. But that only lasted till about 1820 when the factory again started to decline. It was finally closed in 1864.
