THE MICK ARNOLD SET

The Mick Arnold Set © Visual Athletics Club 2012

It all started with a mug.  Or more accurately a rather beautiful porcelain mug sitting with a group of others on a table in the window of Wills Lane Gallery, St.Ives, Cornwall. It was tall and straight sided. A cylindrical object with an elegant handle and hand painted indigo blue spots.

Having purchased this one we were straight back the next day to buy another. That way we wouldn't end up fighting over who got to have tea from the Mick Arnold mug, rather than one of the mass produced Arabia mugs sitting on the same shelf.

Back in London we enjoyed drinking our tea from those mugs so much that we asked Petronilla Silver, the gallerist, if Mick could make us a teapot. Eventually the teapots arrived. We are still using ours on a daily basis - it brews a really tasty cuppa and pours brilliantly  - no dribbling.

Subsequent visits to St.Ives yielded more porcelain goodies - bowls, cups, beakers and plates. Most recently we placed a special commission with Mick for porcelain plates and bowls decorated in that same inky blue. We were not disappointed.

It's a real treat to sit down and eat from such wonderful looking ceramics - each piece slightly different yet there is a visual coherence to the whole set. For years we have been searching for studio made ceramics that combine the aesthetic and the practical - where the much quoted 'form and function' combine in the hands of a highly skilled craftsman. In Mick Arnold's work we finally found it. 

Of course, being porcelain these objects are a trifle delicate. So for washing up they get the full five star 'handle with care' treatment. Now that all the factory produced ceramics have been banished, the Mick Arnold Set takes pride of place in our kitchen!