I am very pleased to add a second biography to the blog. Roland Heath was a designer at Crown Ducal in the 1920's who was involved in designing and producing the Radiance Lustre series of designs for the company in 1927. Roland's granddaughter, Suzanne has written this biography and kindly offered it to be published on the blog so that others with in interest in ceramic history can know more about one of Crown Ducal's designers.
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| Roland Heath |
Roland was born in 1908 to William & Sarah Heath at 2, Lindley Street, Stoke. He was the youngest of 5 children, all of which were very musical. In 1918 they moved to 41, Rushton Road, Cobridge.
Roland was a talented artist, with a flair for design, and there is a record of him first working as a ‘messenger’ at Burslem College of Art in 1921, only 13 years old. In 1923 he won a Senior Art scholarship from the Borough of Stoke-on -Trent, and he spent 3 years studying at there under Gordon Forsyth. From 1924 – 1928 college records show Roland as a ‘senior designer’, presumably as he also worked for Gray’s Pottery while he was a student. Also at the college at the same time was Susie Cooper (a distant cousin from his mother’s side), who is on the register from 1919 – 1925 as a ‘pottery designer’, and Clarice Cliff, who can be seen in the records as working there in 1924 as a ‘pottery decorator’.
Some of Forsyth’s students copied or used his techniques including the lustre glazes. Forsyth developed the Gloria Lustre for Gray’s in the early 1920s while Roland Heath was his student. An example of this can be seen at the V&A, with Roland Heath credited as the painter, Forsyth as the designer, c. 1925:
https://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O1261257/gloria-lustre-bowl-forsyth-gordon
Roland Heath left Gray’s and went to work for Crown Ducal in around 1927. At Crown Ducal he developed the Radiance Lustre Glaze (a version of Gray’s Gloria). He is believed to have created 40+ patterns, but nobody knows how many as most of them aren't marked. We still have a couple of identical vases, which I seem to remember my mother telling me were ‘practice‘ vases. These have his RHEATH mark which can be seen on other pieces of this period:
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| Practice vase |
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| Base of practice vase |
In 1927 Roland supplemented his income by selling many of his designs for Christmas cards, sold through the British and Dominion School of Drawing in London. Some panels were bought by the Association of Home Crafts Studio Ltd (we have letters and receipts for some of these).
In 1929 he obtained a position as an artist with S Hancock & Sons of Burton Place, Hanley. At the end of 1930, Roland left his job in Hanley and went to work for a design studio in Wembley, lodging with his sister Dorothy. In 1933 he took a position with Cinema Signs. I have these in a file of his:
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| Roland's printed designs from 1930's |
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| Roland's printed designs from 1930's |
In 1934 he married Peggy Hunt (see photo) and moved to Harrow. They had
2 children, Gillian & Robert.
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| Peggy and Roland |
Here is a photo of grandpa holding my mother Gillian.
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| Gillian & Roland |
I don’t have any information about where he worked or what he did from then on. The only ceramics we have of Roland’s are a hand-painted coffee set, and the vases above. This coffee set has a more curly mark (see photos). I’m afraid I don’t have dates for these. Unfortunately, when he got older and his mind was not so clear, we were very saddened that he had given away a lot of his pieces which we would have treasured!
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| Coffee set |
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| Coffee set basemarks |
Granpa was a lovely, gentle man. I have many happy memories of visiting him when I was young, He was a very creative man, who loved amateur dramatics, singing and playing the piano. My mother said she grew up in a house where there were always people coming over, singing and playing music into the night. He would always be so pleased to see us and wanted to hear us play the piano for him.
Sadly, my mother died in September, so I am unable to find out any more history than what I have here. I do have a folder of some of his old artwork though (no dates).
