Vintage Wedgwood Bone China Plate – Wild Grasses Silver Ink, 22K Platinum Ribbon, Pattern W4166, England 1960s

A Wedgwood bone china plate from the maker's studio line of the 1960s — painted in the same composition Wedgwood filed in its workshop as pattern W4166. Soft grey watercolour wild grasses drift across the centre: oat grass with hanging seeds, harebells caught between the stems, fine seed-heads suspended on dark lines. Sweeping through the lower third, painted directly into the glaze, a single calligraphic gesture in 22K platinum — a quiet "M" or ribbon-of-water that breaks the monochrome and catches the light.

The mark on the back is the green Wedgwood Portland Vase, with Wedgwood / Bone China / Made in England underneath, plus the painter's red W4166 pattern reference and the workshop's inspector marks. The "W" prefix sits in Wedgwood's bone china production range that ran from the 1950s through the 1980s; W4166 is from the mid-1960s production window, the period when Wedgwood's bone china studio leaned into modernist motifs alongside the more traditional patterns it was still producing for the high street.

This style — monochrome botanical brushwork plus a single platinum or gilt calligraphic flourish — was Wedgwood Bone China's answer to Rosenthal's Studio Linie in Germany and to the Japanese-influenced sumi-e movement that swept through European decorative arts in the 1960s. A matching shallow bowl in this same W4166 pattern is also available in this shop — the two pieces together form a small but complete tea or display setting.

A piece for the Wedgwood Bone China collector hunting the studio / designer end of the catalogue, for the mid-century modernist collector who wants real period work rather than a reissue, or for the Japandi / wabi-sabi interior that wants one element of platinum to anchor the room.