The Pennsylvania Dutch were virtually the only people in America in Colonial days who had a strong, imaginative feeling for color and design; for creative art in their households, and even on such earthy objects as their barns, fences, wagons and weather-vanes. Our knowledge of Pennsylvania-Dutch pottery is based on museums, publications, and artifacts. Southeastern Pennsylvania has much red shale and red clay giving the Dutch potters their opportunity, very soon after they had settled …showed first 75 words of 569 total…

…showed last 75 words of 569 total…then rolled with a rolling pin until they were smooth and to a particular thickness (Powell Pennsylvania German Pottery Tools & Processes 20). The tulip motif appears positively everywhere in Dutch art--even on the barn designs and on the walls. Of course the sgraffito are stunning with them. The Pennsylvania-Dutch tulip design has been found on about 35 different objects of decoration, beginning with barn designs, and continuing on to pottery (Cooper Ten Thousand Years of Pottery 214-225).