Tableware

Vintage Royal Worcester Powder Blue Bowl & Side Plate Pair – Z2738 Raised White Enamel Florals, Silver Rim, Bone China, England 1950s

A two-piece breakfast or dessert pair from Royal Worcester — a small cereal bowl and a matching side plate, each fired in fine bone china with the firm's signature pre-1970s pattern Z 2738. The wide rim runs in soft powder-blue ground, with white blossoms and fern fronds painted in raised pâte-sur-pâte style enamel — full-blown roses opening into bud, slender ferns curling between them — bordered top and bottom by a fine platinum rim that catches light cool rather than warm. The centre wells are left clean white, the bone china translucent against light.

Royal Worcester, founded in 1751 in Worcestershire and holding the Royal Warrant since 1789, is the oldest continuously-operating bone china house in England. Pattern Z 2738 dates to the firm's mid-century output of the 1950s–60s, when Worcester paired a softer, almost pastel ground colour with the high-relief white enamel work that mimics the much older pâte-sur-pâte tradition Royal Worcester had pioneered in the late nineteenth century — a quietly modernist read on a Victorian craft. The result reads equally at home on a 1960s breakfast tray and on a present-day cottagecore table.

The combination — bowl + side plate — works as a breakfast pair (cereal + toast), a dessert pair (pudding + small plate), or as a stacked decorative grouping on a side table. The platinum rim rather than gold gives it a cooler register than most English bone china of the era — a hostess piece for someone who prefers silver over gold at the table.

A pair for the Royal Worcester collector building toward a service, for the mid-century modern dining host, or for the cottagecore / French country interior that runs to powder-blue and silver rather than the more common pink-and-gold palette.

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Details

Type
Bowl & Side Plate Pair (2 pieces)
Maker
Royal Worcester, Worcestershire, England
Era
Circa 1950s–1960s
Pattern
Z 2738 — powder blue rim with white pâte-sur-pâte style roses & ferns, platinum edge
Material
Fine Bone China
Decoration
Powder-blue ground rim with white raised-enamel roses and ferns, platinum rims
Markings
Royal Worcester crown stamp on base of each piece — Bone China / Made in England / Z 2738

Condition

Excellent vintage condition for both pieces. Powder blue ground even; white enamel roses and ferns intact and crisp; platinum rims bright with no rub-through. No chips, cracks, hairlines, or crazing on either piece. Please review all photos as part of the condition record.

Backstamp & Pattern

Maker's mark on the base of Vintage Royal Worcester Powder Blue Bowl & Side Plate Pair
Maker
Royal Worcester, Worcestershire, England
Pattern
Z 2738 — powder blue rim with white pâte-sur-pâte style roses & ferns, platinum edge
Era
Circa 1950s–1960s
Mark on base
Royal Worcester crown stamp on base of each piece — Bone China / Made in England / Z 2738

Royal Worcester's crowned roundel carries a system of dots and marks around it that can often date a piece to the year.

Read the full backstamp & pattern guide →

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