Footnotes

Provenance
Winifred Florence Bury (née Harris)
Thence by family descent to the present owner

This remarkable model was inherited by the granddaughter of Winifred Florence Bury (1885-1980), who came from a farming family in the village of Cublington, Buckinghamshire. In the late 19th century, her parents lived at Fern Cottage on Whitchurch Road, and they farmed at Manor Farm on Ridings Way. Her parents and grandparents were all born in or around Cublington, and it is quite possible that she inherited it from one of them. Following her marriage to Charles Horace Bury in 1908 she moved to Stretford, Manchester, where this cat survived a bombing during the Second World War.

The only other recorded version of this celebrated model was sold by Phillips on 11 September 1991, lot 527, just a year after the conclusion of excavations at the factory site. This is illustrated on the dustjacket of the ECC's Limehouse Ware Revealed (1993), and on p.33, fig.53 alongside a fragment of a front paw excavated from the Limehouse factory site which corresponds exactly to the model. The present lot is almost identical save for the addition of blue markings denoting the animal's fur. Both examples have a number of close similarities to Staffordshire cats of the same period, see the lead-glazed model sold by Bonhams on 9 March 2005, lot 24 and the saltglaze example illustrated by Diana Edwards and Rodney Hampson, White Salt-Glazed Stoneware (2005), p.112, col.pl.82, which are of comparable large size.

It is known that Staffordshire potters worked at the Limehouse factory and other shapes at Limehouse were influenced by Staffordshire prototypes, see for example the Limehouse beaker-form vase illustrated alongside a saltglaze version by Edwards and Hampson (2005), p.100, fig.96 and col.pl.66. That the model of the cat has been slip-cast provides yet another close link to Staffordshire. The Limehouse factory closed in around 1748 and its owner Joseph Wilson later worked in pottery and experimental porcelain at Pomona Inn in Newcastle-under-Lyme, Staffordshire, see Limehouse Ware Revealed (1993), pp.57-8. This may also account for the close similarities between the Staffordshire and Limehouse models. This remarkable cat represents an exciting new addition to the Limehouse oeuvre. Provenance
Winifred Florence Bury (née Harris)
Thence by family descent to the present owner

This remarkable model was inherited by the granddaughter of Winifred Florence Bury (1885-1980), who came from a farming family in the village of Cublington, Buckinghamshire. In the late 19th century, her parents lived at Fern Cottage on Whitchurch Road, and they farmed at Manor Farm on Ridings Way. Her parents and grandparents were all born in or around Cublington, and it is quite possible that she inherited it from one of them. Following her marriage to Charles Horace Bury in 1908 she moved to Stretford, Manchester, where this cat survived a bombing during the Second World War.

The only other recorded version of this celebrated model was sold by Phillips on 11 September 1991, lot 527, just a year after the conclusion of excavations at the factory site. This is illustrated on the dustjacket of the ECC's Limehouse Ware Revealed (1993), and on p.33, fig.53 alongside a fragment of a front paw excavated from the Limehouse factory site which corresponds exactly to the model. The present lot is almost identical save for the addition of blue markings denoting the animal's fur. Both examples have a number of close similarities to Staffordshire cats of the same period, see the lead-glazed model sold by Bonhams on 9 March 2005, lot 24 and the saltglaze example illustrated by Diana Edwards and Rodney Hampson, White Salt-Glazed Stoneware (2005), p.112, col.pl.82, which are of comparable large size.

It is known that Staffordshire potters worked at the Limehouse factory and other shapes at Limehouse were influenced by Staffordshire prototypes, see for example the Limehouse beaker-form vase illustrated alongside a saltglaze version by Edwards and Hampson (2005), p.100, fig.96 and col.pl.66. That the model of the cat has been slip-cast provides yet another close link to Staffordshire. The Limehouse factory closed in around 1748 and its owner Joseph Wilson later worked in pottery and experimental porcelain at Pomona Inn in Newcastle-under-Lyme, Staffordshire, see Limehouse Ware Revealed (1993), pp.57-8. This may also account for the close similarities between the Staffordshire and Limehouse models. This remarkable cat represents an exciting new addition to the Limehouse oeuvre.