This is not intended to be a biography of either Conrad Dressler or Robert Hudson who were well known in their respective fields. So a quick introduction only to both - Conrad was London born and of German and French abstraction. He came to Marlow Common from the Della Robbia pottery in Liverpool which he co founded. He had unfortunately fallen out with his partners - Conrad had something of a habit of quarrelling with those he worked with as we will see. Robert Hudson, who spent every other week in Liverpool for much of the year, was in 1896 the new owner of both Danesfield House and Medmenham Abbey. He planned to pull down the Danesfield mansion almost immediately. The entire estate would be made over and the Abbey restored. He had no shortage of funds at this point to indulge his interests. These included encouraging local craft and industry. This included attempts to revive lace making in the area and to breed traditional British varieties of livestock. He provided the funding for the establishment of the Arts and Crafts inspired Medmenham Pottery and appointed Dressler as his design manager. They were soon co general managers if not so from the beginning. The pottery produced a large range of items, most famously tiles and garden features such as sundials. Conrad continued to take on personal commissions for his busts and sculptures too. Architects could also commission the pottery to make pieces to their own (or clients) design, for an extra fee.
The Beginnings
When Conrad and his wife Nita arrived at Marlow in 1896 the pottery was not ready to begin production. Hudson wished Dressler to superintend the design and erection of the pottery premises. Although the traditional presence of brick making complete with clay deposits at Marlow Common probably bought the site to their attention, the clay that had been dug from the common itself and near the brick making kiln was actually regarded as functionally exhausted already. The brick makers found plenty of clay in the fields around and had made agreements to dig that out. The Medmenham Pottery intended to use local materials and work people as far as possible, as this was in tune with the ethos of the arts & craft movement. But it was discovered that the clay here while good for bricks, was not suitable for the pottery. Conrad refined production methods constantly. His special love was the production of glazed architectural friezes and decorations that needed to be outside in all weathers without crazing, cracking or fading. He'd already done much work in creating the right "recipe" for this at the Della Robbia works. But this was tweaked further at Marlow Common. He found that the Marlow clay could not be successfully fired at the high temperatures he required, without the additional of other materials. (The full list of additives was kept a trade secret!) In 1899 it was reported that the pottery had come to the conclusion is was cheaper to import clay from Staffordshire than to correct the local material. However they had not quite given up on the Marlow clay and experiments were ongoing with the hope of utilising it for less delicate work.
The basic site taken over was one of the two brick and tile making kilns formerly operated by Thomas Butler and Henry Hewett in partnership, and then Butler alone until he went bankrupt in 1893. When that occured, Butler sold up to builder and lime burner Henry Harris, and it's from he the pottery took over the kiln from. (NB Henry Harris continued to operate a brickyard at different premises at Marlow Common until bankruptcy in 1908.) The newly established Marlow Water Company readily agreed to extend their water supply to the works - without which the pottery would have been impossible. The Dressler's immediate residence was at The Limes in Glade Rd which must have been more comfortable than living at an extensive building site. The house at Marlow Common the family would soon live in - "White Cottage" (or White House) was said to have been built specifically for Dressler and to his designs. When author Jerome K Jerome lived there later, it would be known as Monks Corner. It was decorated and still is by Medmenham Pottery tile friezes inside and out.
Trouble a foot
The pottery had not even been fully completed when Conrad found himself in court charged with violently assaulting his former friend and employee Mr Houghton at Bovingdon Green. Houghton had come to Marlow Common to act as the company secretary by arrangement with Conrad. They fell out and Houghton was sacked. The pottery management said this was because his work wasn't satisfactory. Houghton at first refused to accept his dismissal as he was ordered to clear off immediately and this was not in his view proper notice. Robert Hudson subsequently put the dismissal in writing. The next time Dressler saw Houghton, he beat him about the head and chased him across the Green until the latter passed out. Apparently Dressler believed that Houghton was behind some anonymous letters recieved by his wife that accused her husband of improper conduct. He did not deny the assault but his legal representative asks for leniency on the grounds of great provocation. The Marlow magistrates said they regretted for the sake of the neighborhood such a case had come before them, ignored the request for sympathetic sentencing and bound Dressler over in the large sum of £50 to keep the peace. He also had to find an additional person willing to pay a surety for his good conduct, and was fined £2 on top plus costs. Would that be the end of the matter? Not quite. Dressler was subsequently successfully sued by Houghton for repeating the assertion that he had sent the poison pen letters. And furthermore Houghton won a case of wrongful dismissal against the pottery. It is amusing that Conrad is recorded as saying a happy workplace was a "powerful aid in the production of beauty".
The locals need convincing...
One of the main aims of the Medmenham Pottery was to train the local youngsters in the craft. At first some free apprenticeships were offered to 4 local boys. Hudson was going to pay the usual premium required to take on this position, and the young men would also be paid a "slightly" higher wage than was usual locally for those in a similar role. Thereafter premiums would be £20. But it was later reported interest in this opportunity was low, because parents could not be persuaded art pottery was a good career. Conrad thought young people would need 5 years good training. Many adverts appeared in local papers etc asking for teenage girls to come and paint tiles at the pottery. (In 1897 a 15 year old was offered 5s a week for this role.) With this in mind a girls drawing class was started in Marlow to develop the skills that might be useful.
In 1897 he gave a lecture at Bovingdon Green school to parents and other interested adults where he tried to explain his aims and ambitions. He wanted work to be produced by hand because he thought the use of machinery stunted creativity and "enslaved" humans. To work in a beautiful natural environment would be ideal and inspirational, hence the choice of Marlow Common.
Brighter times ...briefly
Moving on to 1899 we find happier times at the pottery. They held an open day and exhibition there for some 300 guests who were apparently very impressed by the items on display which included medallions, sundials, tiles and busts. The companies London agent Hoflers of Soho Square displayed their wares in a showroom and offered them for export. They had completed a large commission for exterior decoration on 12 cottages at Westfield Medmenham, part of Hudson's revamped estates. Each cottage would display a Medmenham Pottery panel depicting a particular month of the year and the activities associated with it. January showed wood gathering, June haymaking and November ploughing for example.
Unfortunately, the company fortunes took a down turn in 1900 when the pottery suffered a severe fire of unknown cause. Starting in the engine house early in the morning, it spread rapidly. Thankfully as work was soon to start enough people were near at hand to rescue a quantity of valuable finished pieces. The engine house could not be saved, nor could the drying room. The premises were insured but much disruption must have been caused. Marlow fire brigade attended with a depleted crew as some had not heard the bell! And the horses struggled to pull the fire engine all the way up Chalk Pit Lane, so progress was slow and the fireman got out to walk and lighten the load. Given that and poor water pressure, it's a wonder as much was saved as was.
Sometimes you feel the Pottery staff must have felt that fates were against them. Even in 1900 when they secured a spot in the Paris International Exhibition, things did not go to plan. When one of the British "jurors" of the category they were exhibiting under went to look for their display in the British Pavillion, he found the attendants couldn't identify any of the pieces. The items had appeared in the catalogue but do not seem to have actually made it on display. The juror did find some uncatalogued pottery items from the Bromsgrove Guild of Applied Arts and from Messrs Martin Bros which had just been used to decorate the pavillion, and oddly he suggested these pieces could be judged under the title "Medmenham Pottery" - but whether this suggestion was taken up I don't know!
New kilns, new ideas
Conrad was constantly innovating and Hudson seems happy to give him fairly free rein to make what improvement he could at the pottery. In 1901 he tore out the kilns put in less than a year before in order to replace them with more economical ones, on the advice of a French expert. An article in the September issue of The Artist that year explained that Conrad had had "heartbreaking disappointments" in attempting to innovate and only his untiring devotion to his work had allowed him to "surmount many difficulties" at Marlow Common.
Dressler wants to create "spontaneous artistic proclivities in the girls he employs" so really original work could come from them, the author said. But apparently Conrad had found the "human material" less promising than he had expected! The magazine seems gently sceptical at this approach but hoped Dressler would strike a vein of some local talent. The work they said, Dressler found a "severe mental and physical tax."
Unfortunately many of Conrad's innovations were made out of necessity for keeping production costs down. He took out many patents during his time at Marlow. He admitted they struggled to meet their buyers expectations of what an art pottery piece could profitably be produced for. In 1902 we are told that Conrad had been forced to introduce some designs that could be stamped out "under dies" rather than hand moulded. This was 25% cheaper but those commissioning pieces could still opt for the less mechanised process if they were willing to stump up more. They were again using mainly local clay, with additives as Conrad had managed to perfect the "recipe" for using it.
His biggest disappointment was - look away now proud Marlovians - the local artistic talent - or lack of it. No native talent had emerged and so "a stricter adherence to rules and orders has had to be observed and the liberty which he hoped to foster when he began potting has had to be curtailed".
Closure
The end of Medmenham Pottery was first reported in November 1902. Some in the trade expected the closure to be temporary and so were surprised when it was announced as permanent. However the South Bucks Standard announced a month or so later that Conrad Dressler had purchased the works from Hudson and would continue much the same as before. For how long he did so is not certain - I've seen dates of anything between 1903-1909 for the end of the pottery at that site. Part of the difficulty is that tiles made to Conrad's designs were subsequently referred to as Medmenham Pottery even when it definitely wasn't made there. The 1908 edition of the Victoria County history of Buckinghamshire says that the pottery had moved to Staffordshire. In 1909 it was reported in the local newspaper that Dressler had sold his Marlow Common home to Jerome K Jerome who certainly lived there later. But Dressler was still present at White Cottage on the 1911 census and in a 1915 Marlow Directory. Work known as Medmenham Pottery tiles were produced by J H Barrett & Co of Stoke on Trent for many years, by agreement with Dressler who died in 1940.
NB the grave of Nita Dressler in an Ohio cemetery bears a bronze sculpture by Conrad, executed the year following her death there in 1928.
Written and researched by Kathryn Day.
Related posts:
Others related to Marlow Common and nearby can be found here
General Marlow history post index - here
Artists in Marlow history - synopsis here
©MarlowAncestors.
SOURCES:
Bergesson, Victoria - Encyclopaedia of of British Art pottery, 1870-1920, Barrie and Jenkins (1991)
Herbert, Henry -
The Decorative Time in Architecture, Phaidon Press (1995)
Lemmen, Hans Van -Art Nouveau Tiles, Shire Books, 2002
Miller, Frederick . The history of art pottery in the British isles. (Article within Supplement to The Art Journal 1902)
Plaited, Arthur Henry - Manor and Parish Records of Medmenham, Buckinghamshire, Longman, Green & co (1925)
Academy Architecture And Architectural Review 1899 Vol 16, Publication date 1899
Reports from His Majesty's Commissioners relating to Paris International exhibition of 1900, HMSO. 1901
Catalogue of the Paris International Exhibition 1900.
The Builder 24th April 1901, May 1902, 19th June 1931.
Bucks Herald 23rd May 1896.
South Bucks Standard 30th Jan 1893, 15th February 1895, 22nd, 29th May & 18th December 1896, 14th May 1897, 21st Jan, 25th March & 6th May, 6th June 1898, 31st March 1899, 26th October 1900, 5th & 19th December 1902.
Uxbridge & W. Drayton Gazette - 11 September 1909, 2nd April 1937
The Victoria County History of Buckingham shire, 1908/9 edition, ed by Wm Page.
Survey of London, Greater London Council, Athlone Press, 1966
Nita's Ohio death registration https://www.familysearch.org/ark:/61903/3:1:33S7-9PK4-9RPY?view=index&personArk=%2Fark%3A%2F61903%2F1%3A1%3AX8GG-HCS&action=view&cc=1307272&lang=en
