'You do not have to be an admirer of Clarice ­Cliff's pottery to relish this biography ... scrupulously researched ... fascinating'
- Sheila Hancock, Observer, 'Books of the Year'

'Clarice Cliff's story could have come straight from the pages of a blockbuster ... There are countless biographies of middle- and upper-middle class women ... but very few of individual working-class women' - Literary Review

'Excellent example of biography as social history'
- Peter Parker, 'A Year in Biographies', Daily Telegraph

'Lynn Knight's evocative life of Clarice Cliff is both biography and social analysis and it reads like a very sophisticated folk tale'
- Fiona MacCarthy, Guardian


Clarice Cliff was one of the most prominent ceramic designers of the twentieth century. Born in 1899 in the Staffordshire Potteries, she started work as just another factory girl, but by 1928 had launched her own range of pottery, 'Bizarre'. A 'gargantuan feast of colour', it blazed a trail through the homes of inter-war Britain. But if Clarice Cliff's rise from apprentice gilder to art director was remarkable - and all the more so for her being a woman - it was not without its tensions; for years, she conducted a secret relationship with her married boss.

Fusing art, design and industry and vividly conveying the texture of women's lives between the wars, this is a compelling study of the complex, talented woman whose work is for many the epitome of art deco.

READ Clarice Cliff 'Prologue'


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HARDBACK £20.00 ISBN 9780747578284
PAPERBACK £8.99 ISBN 9780747579601