For those of you who do not know, the Holland/Netherlands/etc area is famous for its blue and white pottery:
Delft has been making this pottery since 1653. It's incredible. Our darling tour guide, Hannie, guided us through the factory and showed us how it was made. The first part of the tour was a short film that took us step by step through the process of how a vase would be made in the past. Hand-painted, set in the oven, glazed, etc.
BUT, the real kicker is that Delft has been using the exact same process for their products since 1653. Yes, my friends. All of their original Royal Delft plates, shoes, jewelry, vases, etc, are each hand painted. By a person. I watched them do it. It's incredible. Of course, other branches or knock-off versions of the pottery don't all hand paint their stuff. Stencils are used, stamps are used, etc. But, the real mccoy Delft products are hand-painted. She showed us how to spot the difference between a real and a fake by checking out the logo on the bottom.
Another surprise: Royal Delft uses ZERO BLUE PAINT. I kid you not.
What happens, is after the mold is dried and solid, the painters use a special black paint. Hannie gave us the chemical formula for it (no, I don't remember it). After they paint on the black design, the vase/etc goes in the oven and the HEAT is what changes it to BLUE. Then they put the shiny glaze on it:
They had a lot of their more impressive products on display. A huge wall mural, and some of their unique blue and orange/yellow pots that, in the past, were reserved for royalty:
In order to form the actual cast in the mold, the liquid porcelain matter is poured into the mold, as follows:
Once the liquid touches the sides of the mold, it already starts to harden, so once it's filled to the top, it's just a short while until the excess can be poured out, and the mold can be opened (see pic on the right) with just the edges remaining.
It was a really interesting place where I got to learn so much about something that I had zero knowledge about before. Of course, we had some time to spend in their store afterwards. I bought a butter dish for my mom and some earrings for my friends.
Back on the road we went. We stopped at a gas station for a quick meal, probably watched a couple of Harry Potter movies, and finally arrived in Paris!
It was already quite late by the time we arrived at our Ibis hotel. A few friends and I went out that night and grabbed a bite to eat, then returned and passed out. This was the first hotel where it was just two to a room, instead of 6-8. A nice change, for sure.
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