Bottle with arabesque designs (one of a pair)

Saint-Cloud factory

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The porcelain factory established in Saint-Cloud, a town outside of Paris, in the late seventeenth century was the first to produce soft-paste porcelain on a commercial scale in Europe. The blue and white decoration of the objects manufactured there during the early years of the factory was a deliberate reference to the imported Chinese porcelains so popular in Europe at this time.

European Sculpture and Decorative Arts

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The fifty thousand objects in the Museum's comprehensive and historically important collection of European sculpture and decorative arts reflect the development of a number of art forms in Western European countries from the early fifteenth through the early twentieth century. The holdings include sculpture in many sizes and media, woodwork and furniture, ceramics and glass, metalwork and jewelry, horological and mathematical instruments, and tapestries and textiles. Ceramics made in Asia for export to European markets and sculpture and decorative arts produced in Latin America during this period are also included among these works.

Metropolitan Museum of Art