Schönwald porcelain factory
| Schönwald porcelain factory
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| legal form | Branch of BHS Tabletop AG |
| founding | 1879 |
| Seat | Schönwald in Upper Franconia |
| Number of employees | 650 |
| Website | www.schoenwald.com |
The Schönwald porcelain factory is a work of the German porcelain manufacturer BHS Tabletop . The world market leader also owns the rights to the Schönwald brand . The company employs around 650 people at its Schönwald location in Upper Franconia . Schönwald produces porcelain for the hotel, catering and communal catering. The range includes over 1,100 items. It supplies hotels and restaurants, airlines and shipping lines, hospitals and company canteens in over 100 countries.
history
In 1879 Johann Nicol Müller founded a porcelain factory in Schönwald, which at the same time meant an economic boom for the place. The region offered all the raw materials required for porcelain production: kaolin , feldspar and quartz deposits for the porcelain mass as well as wood for the furnace. In 1898 the company already had 340 employees, in the same year the joint stock company "Porzellanfabrik Schönwald" was founded. Towards the end of the 19th century, Schönwald specialized in the hotel porcelain business. The designs should meet the functional requirements of the catering industry, but remind of the style of finer household porcelain.
When the general economic situation deteriorated in the second half of the 1920s, the porcelain industry responded by concentrating companies. The Schönwald porcelain factory was also incorporated into the larger Kahla Group . Under the artistic directors Hermann Gretsch (1930–1950) and Heinrich Löffelhardt (1952–1971) there was a close relationship with the sister company Arzberg .
In 1936, Gretsch designed the Form 98 hotel tableware. For the first time in the history of porcelain, a fully worked out hotel tableware series was on the market. In 1940 she was awarded the gold medal at the VII Triennale in Milan. It is still in production today.
After the division of Germany, the half of the Kahla Group in the west took its seat in Schönwald in 1949. With designs by Heinrich Löffelhardt, the company consolidated its reputation for combining functionality and good form. In the 1970s, the designer Hans Theo Baumann continued this tradition.
In 1972 the Schönwald mother Kahla merged with Lorenz Hutschenreuther to form Hutschenreuther AG. This was restructured in 1998 and has been operating as BHS Tabletop ever since . At the Schönwald site, investments were primarily made in the areas of production and logistics, and in 2009 a full fiber fast-firing furnace was put into operation.
Awards
- 1954: Form 411, Silver Medal of the X Triennale in Milan
- 1957: Form 511, gold medal of the XI. Triennial Milan
- 1962: Hotel tableware 498, Premio internazionale Vicenza
- 1964: form 611
- 1967: Hotel tableware 498, Premio Macef
- 1973: Grid tableware 2298, Federal Prize for Good Form
- 1976: Hotel tableware 898
- 1999: Premiere, iF Design Award
- 2002: Event, red dot design award
- 2005: Signature, iF Design Award
- 2008: Wellcome, red dot design award
- 2011: Grace, iF Design Award
- 2016: Allure, Design Award of the Federal Republic of Germany Special
- 2018: Islands, German Design Award
See also
literature
- Schönwald. The book of hotel china . Ed. V. Porcelain factory Schönwald, Schönwald 1979.
Web links
- Schönwald.com Official Website
Individual evidence
- ↑ Dieter Weigel: BHS invests in its hot heart , Frankenpost , September 25, 2009, p. 13.