Vintage HB Quimper Cup and Saucer with Hand Painted Breton Woman and Folk Flowers

A vintage HB Quimper cup and saucer in French faience, hand painted with a Breton woman, red and green folk flowers and cobalt blue bands, with both pieces signed HB Quimper on the base.

The saucer carries the main scene: a young Breton woman in a black coiffe, red skirt and yellow apron, holding a little posy beside a tall green fir tree, with two birds overhead and a garland of red, blue and green flower sprays around the rim. The cup is painted on one side with a second figure beside a fir, and on the other with a spray of crimson and green leaves dotted with tiny blue flowers, finished with cobalt bands at the rim and foot and a handle striped in blue.

HB was the oldest of the Quimper potteries, with roots going back to the late 1600s, and its painters helped make the little Breton figure famous far beyond Brittany. Each piece here is painted by hand and marked HB Quimper with its shape and decoration numbers, the cup RT F.1047 D.1 and the saucer F.176 D.1 P.9.

The cup measures 10cm in diameter and 6.5cm in height, and the saucer 12cm in diameter and 2cm in height. The inside of the cup is crazed with age and there are a couple of small nibbles to the saucer rim, shown in the photographs, so this pair is best enjoyed as a decorative piece rather than for tea.

Set it on a stack of old books on a kitchen shelf, add it to a dresser alongside other Quimper and blue and white china, or give it a spot on a bedroom chest of drawers for a touch of French country colour. It would make a sweet present for a Francophile or anyone starting a Quimper collection.