Original watercolours by Welsh ceramicist to make ‘rare appearance’ at auction

Nation.Cymru staff/agencies

A series of rare original watercolours by one of the most influential figures in the history of Welsh ceramics is expected to fetch up to £25,000 when it goes under the hammer later this month.

The album of 41 bird studies by William Weston Young, whose work helped shape the fortunes of both the Cambrian Pottery in Swansea and the Nantgarw China Works, will be offered for sale by Rogers Jones Auctioneers in Cardiff on July 27.

Although Young is best remembered as one of the leading figures in Welsh porcelain, he was also an accomplished artist, inventor, botanist and entrepreneur.

Living in the Neath Valley, he painted scientifically accurate studies of birds and plants, many of which later appeared on some of Wales’ most celebrated porcelain.

The collection being auctioned comprises Young’s original working drawings, preserved in a single bound volume of 41 watercolour sketches.

Auctioneer Ben Rogers Jones said: “Young’s name carries real weight among collectors of Welsh ceramics.

“As the draughtsman at the Cambrian Pottery, and the man who later rescued the Nantgarw Pottery, his hand lies behind objects now held in major museum collections.

“Yet his original watercolours rarely appear on the market.

“That combination of true rarity, his standing in Welsh ceramic history, and an appealing natural-history subject makes the album especially desirable for collectors. It’s certainly one to watch in the sale.”

Born in Bristol in 1776, Young moved to the Neath Valley in the late 1790s before joining the Cambrian Pottery in Swansea in 1803, where he worked alongside the naturalist Lewis Weston Dillwyn.

His detailed illustrations of Welsh flora and fauna became a hallmark of the pottery’s finest porcelain.

He subsequently became the principal investor in the Nantgarw Pottery, whose surviving porcelain is now regarded as among the finest ever produced in Wales and is held in collections including the National Museum Cardiff and the Victoria and Albert Museum in London.

Financially disastrous

Although the venture proved financially disastrous, Young played a key role in preserving the pottery after its founders departed.

Away from ceramics, Young also developed the silica firebrick that transformed blast furnaces during the Industrial Revolution, an invention that underpinned the internationally successful Dinas Fire Brick Works in the Neath Valley.

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