Buckingham by Eva Zeisel

This pattern, called Buckingham and designed by Eva Zeisel for Hall, is pretty rare. I’ve only come across a few pieces online over the past few years that I’ve been looking, and they’re usually quite expensive. I’ve seen a couple of mentions that the pattern was inspired by Zeisel’s prison-like view from her Riverside Drive basement apartment, when she first moved to NYC. If that’s true, kudos to the designer for turning a depressing view into something beautiful, though I’ve never come across any authoritative information about the pattern.

I first mentioned Buckingham about a year ago, when I wrote about lovely pillows by Bridget Davies, which remind me a bit of this pattern. I’ve been collecting these images for a while now, while I waited to collect the right piece at the right price. I got the vegetable bowl pictured here:

See how the pattern on each piece is slightly different?

The casserole dish is amazing [look at the lid handle!] but, at over $100, it’s a bit out of my price range:

Another recent Zeisel score is this Hall pitcher that was a promotional item for Macnish Scotch. Can you guess why we wanted it? Hmmm…

If you’re not familiar with Eva Zeisel, I encourage you to check out this site about her. The woman has seriously lived — now 104, she is still working and creating her sensuous forms. She has been a pioneer in her field for over 80 years, and her creative output is daunting to consider. In recent years, she has been collaborating with a couple of designers I know — James and David of Brooklyn-based Klein Reid. She is such an inspiration to me, and I’m glad to finally have a pretext to give her props here.