2: Imperial Porcelain. Historicism

Items from Grand Duke Konstantin Nikolayevich's Service

1848

Designed by Fiodor Solntsev

Imperial Porcelain Factory

Porcelain, with polychrome overglaze painting and gilding with selective matting

In the 1830s and 1840s the Imperial Porcelain Factory produced pieces in the Russo-Byzantine style designed by the artist and archaeologist Fiodor Solntsev (1801-1892). In the 1830s Solntsev made a study of early Russian works of applied art and sketched exhibits in the Armoury Chamber of the Moscow Kremlin. The artist's drawings were featured in the illustrated publication Antiquities of the Russian State and also used in the design of porcelain articles. In 1848 a service was produced on the occasion of the marriage of Grand Duke Konstantin Nikolayevich (1827-1892), the second son of Nicholas I, and Grand Duchess Alexandra Iosifovna (1830-1911), the daughter of the Duke of Saxe-Altenburg. The service was used in the Great Palace at Strelna.