What Color of Dishware Works Best?

[B Edulis]

I have a set of vintage Eva Zeisel Town and Country dishes that I love. One of the things about them that is great is that, like other casual dishware of the mid 20th century--Fiesta, Russel Wright's, etc.--the idea was to mix different solid colors in the same set. So I've got a mixture of forest green, apple green, pink, grey, and gunmetal. When I'm setting the table, I find myself reaching for the colors that work best with the colors of the food I'm serving.

But, if you had to choose, what colors work best for the most foods? White china is, of course, classic, and really does accent everything. So lets just elevate that one to the Dishware Hall of Fame and discuss other possibilities.....My friend Ken feels that grey is bad for almost all food. Another friend thinks blue is deadly. I myself don't particularly like patterned dishes That's two strikes against the inexplicably popular Blue Willow. Perhaps it's about what looks good on the table without food (perish the thought!)...

[wingding]

Besides white,or creamy white,I'd give my vote to green-the green glaze used in a lot of mid century American pottery is very appealing to me.It offsets the colors of most food nicely as well.I have some green dishware from the 1940s-50s,and collect green pottery,so I'm biased.

[Jinmyo]

I use white, black, stainless steel, glass. C'est tout.

[tony h]

It depends what you're serving.  If its a light casual dinner, lunch or supper then use whatever you want.  

If, however, you've just spent 4 hours making a stock, reducing it, reducing the wine, coaxing a sheen out of it, talking to it, telling it that its the best sauce in the world, telling it that it has a depth of colour you've only ever seen in a 3 starred establishment, well then, the only colour is white.

[Robert Schonfeld]

The most successful designer of midcentury dinnerware, Russel Wright, took this subject very seriously. He made menu books for use in his own home that specified certain lines and colors of dishes to be used with certain foods.

Wright came to the conclusion that black was best for Chinese food (and for much food in general). When he designed the original Shun Lee Palace restaurant in New York, he created a set of dishes and serving pieces with black ground and white borders. They were in use at the restaurant until the most recent redesign.

Many people involved in this field believe Wright's dishes show food to its best advantage. His glazes have a soft quality and depth that make them a great background for food.

[Wilfrid]

White, always white.  Except that I have some very nice Spode plates with pictures of game birds.  When I get them out, I often use them just as place settings, then serve the food on white plates.

[yvonne johnson]

We've always used white, most of the time the plain, reasonably cheap Habitat (now defunct Conran-owned company in UK?) chinaware. Around a year ago, I inherited my parents' white Thomas of Germany white, elegant porcelain dinner service. Much plainer, and classical looking than is suggested here.

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[Robert Schonfeld]

For those who prefer white, have a look at Eva Zeisel's Museum line, commissioned by the Museum of Modern Art in  New York.

In our house, we use Royal Copenhagen Blue Fluted for everyday. What do others use?

[Wilfrid]

I use the Brasserie line of white dishware at Williams and Sonoma.  Sturdy too.

[stefanyb]

In our house, we use Royal Copenhagen Blue Fluted for everyday. What do others use?

You use this for every day? Wow.  They are my favorite and I have been amassing them since 1964.  I also have some (service for 16) of the blue flower pattern of Royal Copenhagen and also some half lace and full lace pieces.  My most prized piece is a 22" platter of blue fluted from around 1800.

I don't use them for every day, though.  Bravo to you for doing so.

To paraphrase Will Rogers, I never met someone who had Royal Copenhagen Blue Fluted that I didn't like.

[B Edulis]

I knew white would win! But this is fascinating.

Robert, I agree with you that Russel Wright's glazes are wonderful, so are Zeisel's T+C, which are similarly subtle and nuanced. Both T+C and Wright's American Modern (I think that's the pattern) have recently been put back in production. I haven't seen the AM but the Metropolitan Museum version of T+C is appallingly bad -- the glazes are dense and opaque, and the all the defined edges -- so important to the biomorphic design -- have been rounded! I hope that the Wright dishware is better!

It's a great idea to use a more decorative plate as the placeholder or charger at a formal meal. I'll bet the Spode game birds are lovely....

Do many of you mix patterns?

[Robert Schonfeld]

stefanyb: This is the influence of my wife (coming up on 25 years!) She always says we should use good dinnerware and flatware everyday, and cloth napkins (and *never* any packages or containers on the table; even Chinese takeout or pizza is transferred to serving pieces before consumption). We were lucky enough to be able to buy large lots of RC Blue Fluted at auction years ago, and we've been adding to them ever since. Can't get enough of those half and full lace pieces for serving and dessert. I chipped a dinner plate last week. Still hurts.

B Edulis: In general, I don't care much for reproductions. In the case of RW, he was such a stickler with his glazes (he used a ceramic consultant from Alfred University), that it would be difficult, if not impossible to match his best. The reissues using the Iroquois Casual glazes may be easier and better as reproductions (I haven't seen them yet), as these to not have the depth and variation of the best examples of his earlier American Modern. RW also did several excellent lines of decorated dinnerware, my favorites being Harker White Clover and Knowlles Esquire in the Grass pattern. Each was innovative in its own way. For those who may not know, one of his biggest contributions to dinnerware design was the rimless dinner plate. He also designed the first sucessful plastic dinnerware from the new material melamine.

[Liza]

We use big white dishes, but lately I've been serving some things on a piece of black glass.  It's frightening to think of the time and planning and care that goes into the plating and serving, when most of the time I'm eating in my pajamas.

[Robert Schonfeld]

Sorry, I should have added that Russel Wright also designed a line of all white porcelain dinnerware called Theme Formal. It's beautiful, rare and expensive.

I might also have added that I am the originator and co-curator of the current exhibition at Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum titled "Russel Wright: Inventing American Lifestyle", hence my greater-than-usual interest in this topic. If time allows, I'd be glad to give a small group of E-Gulleteers a tour of the exhibiton, which runs through September. If, by some chance, a larger group is interested, I'm sure I could arrange a tour through the Education Dept. at the museum.

[Liza]

Yes, please!

[wingding]

Yes please!too....I've already seen [and love] the exhibit,but it would be a privilege to go through the show with you,if possible.

[Sandra Levine]

I, too, have already seen and loved the exhibit, but would also appreciate the private tour. I'm so glad that Wright is enjoying a revival.

My dishes are unWright-like:  a Wedgwood eartherware pattern, "Lotus," vaguely Chinese in feeling, with a pale blue-white background and lots of cobalt blue and sienna in the pattern.  My husband chose the pattern at the time we got married, 25 years ago, having grown up in a home where the Royal Copenhagen mentioned above was "good" china.  I tend to feel that plain white is best for showing off food, but I do love my Lotus.  I often mix it with solid blue pieces.

[stellabella]

Well, my response is going to make you gag, B Edulis.

I love dishes as much as I love food, for reasons entirely different from those which make me food obsessive--I don't think about food and dishes together, in other words.  When I'm eating I want to enjoy both the food and the plate, but not necessarily the relationship between.

As for the inexplicably popular blue willow, first introduced to the Western table by Joseph Spode, I have a set of cheap Willoware from perhaps the 30s or 40s and I love them --i think combinations of blue and white set the prettiest table

I have three different patterns of ironstone--my favorite being my Spode Chinese Rose--and I have a gorgeous Spode Bermuda turkey platter--hauled home from the UK in my lap.

I have twelve place settings of Portmeirion botanical garden, which I know to be held in utter contempt by most people but j'adore.

For everyday i ahve fourteen place settings of contemprary Fiesta ware [and they keep coming out with more groovy colors!]--these plates I have collected over the last fifteen years, often pcikin gthem up from seconds binds for a couple bucks apeice--not a one of them has a nick--I can't imagine a more durable dish.

I have six fabulous pottery plates, brown with pale blue hand-glazed birds in the center, from Mexico--great for intimate dinner parties.

My dessert/breakfast/bread plates are all mismatched--this gives mt the opportuntiy to have pieces I like of many different patterns.  Ditto my coffee-tea cups and mugs--I drink from simple 25 cent Syracuse china seconds or ancient chipped Johnson Bros mugs--depends onmy mood & the season.

Dishes dishes dishes.  Rarely meet one I don't like

[stellabella]

oh, robert--cloth napkins--ALWAYS--paper--NEVER

and it kills me how my guests will sometimes refuse to USE them, like they don't want to MESS THEM UP :confused:

[Jinmyo]

Paper napkins? Fine for blowing your nose in if there's nothing else around. I wouldn't eat anywhere that uses them. If travelling, which I do seldomly for the past years, I'll use one of the handkerchiefs I usually have with me first.

[Liza]

I so often mis-remember the "NO wire hangers" scene in "Mommie Dearest" as "NO paper napkins".

[stefanyb]

I might also have added that I am the originator and co-curator of the current exhibition at Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum titled "Russel Wright: Inventing American Lifestyle", hence my greater-than-usual interest in this topic. If time allows, I'd be glad to give a small group of E-Gulleteers a tour of the exhibiton, which runs through September. If, by some chance, a larger group is interested, I'm sure I could arrange a tour through the Education Dept. at the museum.

Name the day and time and I'll be there.

[Blondie]

Robert, thank you for the insight and please count me in on a tour. I've heard great things about the exhibit from everyone at the design school I attend. It's also of particular interest to me as I work in kitchen design too :-).

Blondie

[Priscilla]

I know most people prefer white, and that it's the choice too of most restaurants, and I don't hate it, either.  But I will put in that quality and design are what's important to me, and there are white dishes and white dishes.

But my own very disparate collection, American, mostly, but I do not reject English or French, assembled over years and indeed, assembling as we speak, is typified by pink.  Just recently added a couple of pieces of Harkerware with the most beautiful speckled pink interior and semi-matte grey outside.  (No Fiesta, Stellabella--HLC's pink is too rose for me.)

Course then, there's the Villeroy and Boch green and black marble chargers, big as a steering wheel, and the green French stoneware, and a bit of Heathware, waiting to be pressed into service.

Never EVER paper napkins, worldwithoutendamen.

Priscilla

[tony h]

What about shape?  I have both round and square plates plus little rectangluar sushi-like ones that are prefect for desserts.  Although, I do find it harder to arrange food on square plates.   I also have long thin rectangular & oval plates which are also great for starters & desserts.  All white, of course.