What a beautiful sight it is to see a complete dinner set of some 50+ pieces. In the days
of large households with servants, sets could contain everything from egg cups to large
serving trays, with each place-setting comprised of seven or more pieces. Imagine the
washing up! These days households are smaller and people tend to buy simple sets in
multiples of 4-place settings to accommodate dinner parties and family get togethers as
needed.

Many sets on sale for the retro, vintage and antique collectors are missing key pieces
and so a hunt begins to backfill the missing pieces. One has to be lucky to pick up what
you need (we are looking for a Royal Doulton, Wistaria teapot if anyone knows of one
for sale!). Increasingly in online stores we see dinner sets being split and sold by the
piece. What do you think of this? Leave a reply below – it would be great to start a
discussion on this. At The Hariet Emporium we are of two minds about this. When we
collect an incomplete set we sell by the piece, such as with our Clarice Cliff 1940s
dinner ware, which we are trying out on our new Etsy Store. Hopefully a customer will
find that missing piece for their collection. However, when we have a nearly complete
set we hold it together and offer it as an unbroken set. We have done this with a
fabulous 1930s set called Orchid D5215 by Royal Doulton – you can see this at our
online shop The Hariet Emporium. It would make a fabulous wedding gift.

Years ago while travelling in Ames Iowa I (Hariet Senior) visited a second hand bric-a-
brac store. I was enchanted to see so many intact Victorian and Edwardian dinner
services. It got me wondering about whether families in this part of the world moved less
once they set up a home – and so there were less opportunities for sets to be broken. In
Australia I think the tendency for families to move about a fair bit has had a taxing effect
on crockery sets – that and the harsh water in many outback places has left a toll on the
condition of dinner sets. Part of the fun of being a collectible’s enthusiast is to bring
incomplete sets back to life. Let us know if you are looking for a piece for your
collection – we will certainly keep an eye out for it.

Happy Days of foraging for all of you collectors out there!

The Hariets