The Minton Archive

A pinch and a punch for the first of the month... and a new Folio Friday thrown in for good measure too! This month you can zoom in on the eight drawings that together make up the various sections of a ceramic bottle design: themintonarchive.org.uk/folio-friday-n…

We've just posted a quick guide to registered design diamond marks (and Minton's yearly marks) to the blog: we're hoping it'll help you decipher some of the many painted, printed, and impressed marks you might find on your Minton pieces! themintonarchive.org.uk/diamonds-are-f…

A recent enquiry all the way from Western Maryland, USA, had us matching up the Minton tiles in a richly-decorated church entrance with the patterns in our archive - a bit of cross-continental tilespotting! themintonarchive.org.uk/tilespotting-u…

They really broke the mould with this month's Folio Friday highlight! No, really... the design's matching shape photograph has "Broken" pencilled across it 😬 themintonarchive.org.uk/folio-friday-j…

Over on the blog we've previously covered the cleaning and conservation work being done as part of our new funded project; now we're doing the same for the packaging, documentation and digitisation! themintonarchive.org.uk/everything-in-…

It's the first Friday of the month and so another Art & Design highlight has hit the blog 🥳 The Folio Friday bonus content continues too: we've been leafing through the shape photograph books once again to match this design up with its 3D counterpart😊 themintonarchive.org.uk/folio-friday-j…

We recently got the opportunity to film the archive service's conservator, Lisa, as she talked us through some of the conservation processes and techniques being applied to one of the Majolica Box's largest (and most fragile!) designs: themintonarchive.org.uk/spring-cleanin…

We're back with another artwork-and-shape-book Folio Friday combo 😊 This month it's a double (or maybe a triple!) whammy as we highlight two artworks sharing the same shape number annotation and then get a further surprise in the shape book: themintonarchive.org.uk/folio-friday-m…

An important part of The Minton Archive is getting a bit of a spring clean, as the artworks and illustrations of the Majolica Box begin a programme of cleaning and conservation: themintonarchive.org.uk/spring-cleanin…

It's official: for the next few Folio Fridays we're going to pick out Art & Design highlights with shape number annotations and then cross-reference them against our collection of shape and photograph books - just because we can! Should be fun😊themintonarchive.org.uk/folio-friday-a…

For the first catalogue update of 2025 we've taken inspiration from last year's post on registered designs and added 141 images related to diamond marks to the online catalogue: themintonarchive.org.uk/catalogue-upda…

For last month's Folio Friday we matched up our artwork highlight with a photograph of its corresponding shape, and we enjoyed the process so much we've picked out another shape-annotated item so we can do it again! themintonarchive.org.uk/folio-friday-m…

Folio Friday is back once again, and this latest instalment marks the series' ninth anniversary!😮 As is tradition, we've returned to the very first highlighted folio to pick out a new artwork (along with a bonus shape photograph too!) 🥳 themintonarchive.org.uk/folio-friday-f…

Our first Pairing Up instalment of 2025 has us paring (🤦) things back to a single duo of designs. There's still plenty to uncover though, including using the information from one artwork to help us create something new from the other! themintonarchive.org.uk/pairing-up-par…

Hello 2025! The Minton Archive is back bright and early with the first Folio Friday of the new year, and it's a bumper instalment: explore not one but FOUR artworks in hi-res detail here: themintonarchive.org.uk/folio-friday-j…

🎄A very Merry Christmas to you from the Minton Archive! 🎄 We're taking our usual break until the new year, but you can see what we've been up to over the last 12 months in our 2024 Minton recap: themintonarchive.org.uk/merry-christma…

December's Folio Friday is a bit of a special one as it features a previously unseen artwork connected to the Hizen Vase - an item we've mentioned multiple times on the blog. Check out the hi-res zoomable artwork + links to our previous Hizen encounters: themintonarchive.org.uk/folio-friday-d…

It's time for October's Folio Friday, the first zoomable, hi-res highlight in a little while - there were just too many details to fit them into our usual format! Enjoy exploring this reference drawing of a Tyrolean majolica stove in detail🔍themintonarchive.org.uk/folio-friday-o…

It's the Minton Archive website's 9th birthday today: Happy Birthday to us! 🎂 As usual we've prepared a special Anniversary Update to celebrate the occasion, with new browsable volumes just a click away! 🥳themintonarchive.org.uk/anniversary-up…

The item from which this month's Folio Friday highlights are taken is only about the size and width of a ruler, but still manages to contain seven dainty little illustrations - more than enough for us to feature on the blog! 🔍themintonarchive.org.uk/folio-friday-s…