6 minute read
Hospitality column
Why I love ceramics, and the people who make them
About G & G
Founded by Paul and Valda Goodfellow, G & G Goodfellows is a highly creative design & Distribution Company with an amazing showroom in Little Portland Street. Offering a truly hands-on service, Goodfellows passion is to bring new and exciting, bespoke food presentation concepts to the UK’s culinary scene. As well as offering a wide variety of the world’s best branded tableware, kitchen equipment, clothing and machines, Goodfellows also collaborates closely with UK craft producers for totally unique products. It works with all sizes of restaurant and catering projects, happy to supply anything from an individual plate to a full restaurant concept.
Valda Goodfellow is in a reflective mood. A life-long fan of ceramics, our columnist looks at what first attracted her to the industry…
Iwarn you now, I might be delirious! I am recovering from Covid and have a sense that I might not be thinking the same way I once was.
The UK prime minister Boris Johnson has gone, no transport in the UK is working and we are hotter than the rest of the planet.
Thank you Boris, at least for the
vaccines and the entertainment, which is more than I can say for food at present. Losing your sense of taste and smell is a great leveller. It strips back what food is actually for and makes you question what all the fuss is about. tableware journey began.
Maybe I was born at a very late age, or I was a product of a time when collecting antiques was very trendy – please don’t judge me, I am quite old and was always a bit nerdy. My early engagement with ceramics involved trailing around antique fairs collecting things I liked
rather than things that might be future heirlooms and without exception I was drawn to ceramics. Anything from Spode’s Willow pattern (very ‘80s) or the pioneering Clarice Cliff, were
Well, what I now know for sure, the food experience is not taste, it is about engaging all the senses. Working from home, robbed of taste and smell, still makes me yearn for the enriching surroundings of gorgeous design, ambience, and the sharing of a food experience with those we love. But I would
swap, any time, the salty pop of caviar, for a hug from my son over a pizza!
So, when it comes to the role we play in the whole hospitality experience, it makes me sentimental for how my whole
My early engagement with ceramics was trailing around antique fairs collecting things I liked rather than things that might be future heirlooms and without exception I was drawn to ceramics
treasures to me purely for their design. I confess, I didn’t care what type of ceramic it was. I didn’t know fine bone from poor porcelain but what I knew was the feel of bone china, and how marvellous a cup of tea tastes out of a china cup, was one of my first loves that would linger in my memory like a tender teenage kiss – well, early teenage kiss.
Since then, ceramics has been a lasting love which manifests itself in this approbation of ceramic designers. I love you all for the sheer creativity and determination you physically pound into a virgin form, to produce everything from the exquisite to the functional. For thousands of years man has worked with clay to create something entirely incredible.
In our industry, there are a few designers who make you want to run your fingers along the rim of a plate, to feel the beauty of their work, and I am happy to say that we have somehow found each other. These designers and producers engage at every level of their craft and forge emotional links to those who care where their work. We have always had a pact with our originators that they can become part of this relationship, and yes, there are three people in this relationship – us, the originator and the customer.
There are those that stand out from the harsher realms of commercialism; notwithstanding that the more commercial producers do a great job. The designers and producers who can do the unexpected, not the just the viable. Those, who like Clarice Cliff, believe ‘having a little fun at my work does not make me any less of an artist’.
In today’s industry, it takes guts to be different, but it takes money to survive. So, we try to make those originators not only loved by fans in hospitality, but also commercially successful. Hospitality is about all the senses, so apart from the food, tableware is a hugely important sensory part of the experience. Form, touch, colour, decoration. They are a mercurial mix of ingredients that are subject to the black art of the kiln which come together to produce an individual unique item.
My modern-day heroes are those who push us to engage them with customers.
Not because they question what we do, but because they are eager to learn why people want their creations, what they do with them and what can be
done better.
These are the originators who try to better understand our customers, and they are the same people who – when they see their products on the table – smile with the same pride that a mother or father does when their child wins the egg and spoon race.
There are a few which top my list, don’t ask me to pick the best because it would be like saying which is your favourite child so I will list them alphabetically. Charlie Martens known as Studio Mattes (probably the nicest man in the whole ceramics world), a powerhouse of creative talent and hard worker who talks as easily to the world’s best chefs as he does to us. Stefanie Hering who is a huge talent who has guided her business Hering Berlin through the ups and downs of fashion to emerge as an icon and Ana Roquero who embodies the spirit and excitement of Spanish design and who pushes the boundaries to know not only what to create but why. And finally, Delphine Stroesser (Montgolfier) who I believe is a genius when it comes to reactive glazes and who has made her brand an enduring chefs’ favourite.
These all, and more, embody that same spirit of creative collaboration which makes our relationship with hospitality customers so much more valuable. To be able to link designer and producer to product is a truly special thing that somehow seems to be conveyed through the products.
Once I regain my senses of smell and taste I know I will truly appreciate those senses more but for now, I just want to look and touch and know that these beautiful objects don’t only do the job they were meant for, they do so much more.
Cookplay Montgolfier
Did you know?
Young Valda Goodfellow was inspired by anything from Spode’s Willow pattern or the pioneering Clarice Cliff. Today, she is inspired by a few creators – Charlie Martens of Studio Mattes, Stefanie Hering of Hering Berlin, Ana Roquero and Delphine Stroesser, Montgolfier.
