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2009.09.24 San Carlos Pillow Vase

I’ve seen a few examples of this pottery around, but by most accounts there’s very little to go on as far as information about the company. It’s agreed for the most part that San Carlos Pottery was located in the town of San Carlos, CA in the Bay area - sort of northwest of Palo Alto.

The output of the pottery seems to be between 1930 and 1950. Most of what I’ve seen so far are vases, in particular pillowvases similar to the one shown above. I snapped this photo at a thrift awhile back without realizing that I didn’t have an example of the company. Of course when I went back, it was gone. According to Chipman’s Encyclopedia the company also made figurines, such as deer similar to Padre and Cemar. Most items seem to be solid color, undecorated glazed, though one or two items I’ve seen have sported a drip glaze.

I’ve come across a few intriguing clues about the San Carlos company through Ebay auctions. The first is an exaggerated “Alladin lamp” style of vase that was clearly marked as West Coast pottery. However, I’ve seen this exact lamp marked with the San Carlos name. I don’t know if there’s a tie between the two companies or not.

The second was a beige vase that was marked as “San Carlos Pottery” but had an interesting inscription written right on the front of the vase. It said “To: Uncle Will / Co-founder of the San Carlos Pottery / Dec 3, 1948″. Unfortunately, I forgot to save the auction text - but if I recall, the seller didn’t know about it either. If anyone has any information about who “Will” might be, or knows anything else about the San Carlos Pottery, please let us know.

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Note: We've tried to provide as much info as possible on this pottery maker or artist. For further info, you may want to research the items they have on Ebay listed under this name. We've tried to hand tailor the searches below so they will bring up the most accurate results. If there are no results, it will list general California pottery.