Harvest Jugs for The Merchant’s table by artist Annabel Pearl.

Harvest jugs started to be made in the early eighteenth century as vessels to serve ale or cider in at the harvest celebrations, and these simple terracotta and slipware jugs bring a feeling of everyday joyful celebration into a home.

As harvest jugs grew in popularity and became highly desirable their status grew.  Soon they were being commissioned by aristocrats, farmers, and landowners to commemorate special occasions and became prized possessions in England and America.  These handcrafted keepsakes rarely left the families they were made for and are now highly collectible as much for their beauty as for their importance as artefacts of social history.

The harvest jugs Annabel made for The Merchant’s Table all honour both the imagery and ceramic techniques used by the Master Craftsmen family: George, Robert and Edwin Beer Fishley whose beautiful work can be found in The Fitzwilliam Museum. The decorative vitality of the Fishley harvest jugs is charming and soulful, and their rotund bellies abundantly express sentiments of love, joy and friendship.

Using traditional terracotta and cream slip, Annabel has drawn into the clay with sgraffito and finished the jugs with a warm honey-coloured glaze.  The visual stories and imagery she has decorated the jugs with depict the plants, animals, birds and myths of the magical landscape of Suffolk.

The Maritime Harvest Jug was especially popular in the 1870s and was deemed a lucky piece to have in a home. Annabel’s maritime jug features the Pin Mill Mermaid, the whales of Shingle Street and the Aldeburgh Galleon. Herrings race alongside the fast-moving galleon in the foam of the waves, and the jug tells a tale of courage, romance and the call of the sea.

The Medieval Hunting Harvest Jug takes its imagery from: The Hawstead Panels; intricate devotion paintings made by Lady Drury, now housed in Christchurch Mansion, Ipswich. The panels illustrate the poetry of John Donne using images of Suffolk woodland: acorns, oak leaves, The Oxlip (County flower of Suffolk and still found in Suffolk’s Ancient Woodland) and Wood Violets alongside hunting hounds and a Red Kite.

The Floral Harvest Jug features the highly prized tulips that had arrived in Suffolk in 1634 from the Ottoman Palace Gardens alongside the Green-Winged Orchids and Meadow Saffron still found along the riverbank of the Deben in Woodbridge. The Oxlip, Snake’s Head Fritillary (later much admired and drawn by Charles Rennie Mackintosh during his stay in Suffolk), and the Oak Eggar Moth.

The Lion & Unicorn Harvest Jug with the lively Lion and Unicorn heraldry inscribed on this jug is found in over thirty Suffolk village churches. The popular Lion and Unicorn nursery rhyme spoke to the congregation of loyalty and courage and on this harvest jug the coat of arms and is surrounded by decorative sprigs of the courageous Suffolk native wildflowers: Lady’s Bedstraw, Lady’s Smock and Herb Robert.

Approx Dimensions:
The Maritime Harvest Jug
The Medieval Hunting Harvest Jug: 
The Floral Harvest Jug:
The Lion & Unicorn Harvest Jug: