Smithfield Pottery original linocut

A three-stage reduction linocut of the former Smithfield Pottery in Stoke-on-Trent, hand-printed in 2017. The kiln and buildings are Grade 2 listed, and have stood in Stoke-on-Trent city centre, in Hanley, since it opened in 1880. The pottery was named after the adjacent cattle market, and the name has stuck to the present day with the recently redeveloped area around the pottery carrying the Smithfield name. The former pottery kiln is the only surviving short necked muffle kiln in the Potteries, and has been well restored and preserved. It has been used as a restaurant, but is currently in use as offices. As you can see from the linocut, there are some very modern buildings behind it, and it's great to see a mix of ancient and modern in Stoke-on-Trent where historic buildings are valued and integrated into much needed regeneration projects. we used to live very near to this bottle kiln, in fact it was at the end of our road, and it used to have a massive, obsolete but very unusual office block behind it! 
 
This is the third in my series of Stoke-on-Trent historic potteries linocuts. I had just made two which were very bright, and decided to try a blue / purple / black combination with this one. It has been quite a favourite, which I'm very glad of as initially I was disappointed that the purple didn't quite work as I had hoped. I'm now really quite fond of it!
 
This is one of a limited edition of 14 linocuts. It is hand-printed on white Zerkall paper, using Cranfield water-based relief ink. The image is 10cm x 12cm, (roughly A6) and the paper is 19 x 26.5cm. Each print is hand-inked and hand-printed, so each is slightly different giving them each a unique quality. As this is a reduction print, the lino plate is gradually cut away during the process so that no more prints can be made.