Royal Doulton | Old English Coaching Scenes (D6393) | Square Bowl with Canted Corners | Series Ware | Burslem, England, 1953–1967

The coaching inn was England’s great shared threshold — where rank dissolved briefly into waiting, weather, and the shared inevitability of travel. The Coaching Scenes series preserves that world not as nostalgia, but as reconstruction.

Royal Doulton’s Old English Coaching Scenes series, pattern D6393, was produced between 1953 and 1967. Designed by W. E. Grace, the series is distinguished by his facsimile signature incorporated directly into each scene, acknowledging authorship within a largely transfer-based production method. The printed brown backstamp features the Royal Doulton lion and crown above the titled cartouche Old English Coaching Scenes / Made in England, with pattern number D6393 and registration numbers Rd. Nos. 31933–49.

This example is the square bowl with canted corners, a shallow architectural form with a broad, slightly raised rim enclosing a full interior scene. The composition depicts a stagecoach halted outside a timber-framed inn, horses attended by grooms while a traveller in period dress stands in the foreground with a sheepdog at his side. Chickens move undisturbed across the yard, reinforcing the everyday stillness of the moment. The village street recedes behind in layered perspective under a muted sky, rendered in the series’ characteristic palette of warm ochre, terracotta, soft greens and brown-toned shading, hand-finished over transfer outlines. The designer’s signature “W.E. Grace” appears within the lower right of the scene. A fine green line defines the rim; the reverse is plain.

Light age-consistent crazing is present across the glaze, typical of mid-century Royal Doulton earthenware. There are no chips, cracks, or losses to decoration.

• Maker: Royal Doulton, Burslem, England
• Series: Old English Coaching Scenes
• Pattern: D6393
• Registration: Rd. Nos. 31933–49
• Designer: W. E. Grace (facsimile signature within scene)
• Form: Square bowl with canted corners
• Material: Earthenware with transfer-printed and hand-finished decoration
• Country of Origin: England
• Period: 1953–1967
• Dimensions: 22 cm x 22 cm x 5 cm
• Weight: 613 g
• Condition: Good; light age-consistent crazing throughout; no chips, cracks or losses

The Coaching Scenes series does not depict a remembered England so much as an assembled one — carefully composed from fragments of history into something orderly enough to be kept.