Set of Six Lenox Ivory Porcelain Basketweave Salad Plates

Set of six round Lenox salad plates in glazed ivory porcelain, with molded basketweave centers and pierced rims. The weave radiates outward from the center of each plate in concentric rows, recalling the way a round basket is built from its base. At the edge, evenly spaced openings carry that rhythm into the rim and let the tablecloth show through. The ivory glaze catches the light on the raised pattern, making the texture especially clear when seen from the side.

Lenox traces its origins to the Ceramic Art Company, founded in Trenton, New Jersey, in 1889 by Walter Scott Lenox and Jonathan Coxon Sr. The workshop began with art porcelain and took the Lenox name in 1906. In 1918, the firm made the official White House dinner service for Woodrow Wilson, the first such service produced by an American china manufacturer. Ivory porcelain became one of the company’s signatures. In these plates, that familiar material takes on the texture of an everyday woven object, carrying the language of basketry into fine American tableware.

Seen together at six place settings, the plates give the repeated weave a presence of its own. The openwork shows clearly over a colored dinner plate, while on plain linen the ivory glaze and the shadows in the rim take the lead. The salad size also works for a first course, a slice of cake, or an afternoon table. For a Lenox collector, the set brings together two treatments of the same motif, a tight weave in relief across the center and a more open pattern at the edge.

Condition note: one of the six plates has a chip, as shown in the detail photograph.

Dimensions:
8.2 in diameter × H 1 in