When Josiah Wedgwood opened his first pottery factory in June 1769, he could not have imagined how successful the pieces would become.  Fascinated by the whole process of producing ceramics, Josiah experimented with a range of metallic oxides to achieve the distinctive blue and black bases and, as a master craftsman, created many of the white relief mouldings used as decoration. Elected to the Royal Society in 1783 for revolutionising ceramics production, Josiah Wedgwood died in 1795 leaving his children with a hugely successful business that thrives to this day.

(more…)