West German pottery: Ceramano

Ceramano was founded in 1959 by Jakob Schwaderlapp, who also started Jasba. The company was created to provide higher-end art ceramic pieces to complement the less expensive, mass-produced Jasba lines. Ceramano pieces were more like studio ceramics, as they were of better quality and were sometimes more experimental. Although most companies used molds to speed production, some Ceramano pieces were made by hand.

Many of the bases of Ceramano vases are hand-marked and include the name of the decor (style/line). The principal designers, although there were others, were Hans Welling and Gerda Heuckenroth. You might remember from the previous post in this series that Heuckenroth also designed for Carstens.

In the 1970s, as studio ceramics lost their popularity, Ceramano bought the Waku Feuerfest Keramik factory in order to step up their mass-production, but this venture proved unsuccessful, and the company closed in the 1980s.

Note: I encourage you to go to the websites I cite in this series. They do a much more thorough job of providing information on each company, as this series is meant only to be an overview. On those sites, you will find a wealth of specific information about designers, decors and production methods. In particular, Ginny and Forrest Poston of Gin-For's Odditiques do an outstanding job of explaining the markings of each company.

From potsandpots.com and ginforsodditiques.com

etsy.com - PasterCorte

etsy.com - CzechGlassCollector

etsy.com - RetroFatLava

etsy.com - 1001vintage

etsy.com - AustinMetroRetro

etsy.com - fotobox

etsy.com - vintage2remember

flickr.com - julianshimmin

etsy.com - ginforsodditiques

Here are some excellent photos of Ceramano markings from Ginny and Forrest Poston's site. They note the clay used by Ceramano is usually reddish brown and that the markings are usually hand-made and include the name of the company and the decor and often the initials of the designer. However, they also say that some items have been found with very few markings.

genforsodditiques.com

ginforsodditiques

The following bottom is of a Ceramano piece has lines resulting from wire being used to separate the vase from the table of the wheel. This technique originated with Japanese potters, but it has been used worldwide.

ginforsodditiques.com