ceramic plates

My favorite ceramic bowls are fun, functional, and decorative. Using pretty ceramic bowls, platters, mugs, and soup tureens, makes food preparation and serving meals fun! With all the colors, shapes, and sizes, my favorite ceramic bowls are functional, decorative, and magical. 

Two years ago my husband and I sold, gave away, and disposed of everything we owned except for 1 full-sized suitcase each, a personal bag each, and our laptops and moved to Boquete, Panama for a year. Read about Boquete here.

My love for ceramic stuff was fully nurtured while there because ceramic items were all over and cheap, with very vibrant colors.

When we returned, to Canada we had to start with new or used items and I decided it was the best time to improve our carbon footprint by replacing plastic and melamine products and indulging in my great increased fascination with ceramic items.

I have bought new items and have bought from thrift stores to start growing my collection again. I love the old antique ones as well as the newer funky styles so it is quickly becoming an interesting assortment.

Favorite ceramic bowls are fun shapes, sizes, colours and uses

colorful ceramics by mana

I just love going into a kitchen and seeing all the ceramic bowls in use, or soon to be in use, especially for special events or holidays!

The fruit bowl on the counter or on the dining room table, the home decor vases in the living room, and plant pots around our home are all part of the ceramic appeal.

Ceramic bowls, platters, and storage containers for stuff like coffee, sugar, and tea are what most of us have come to know as ceramic items.

Ceramic bowls, platters, mugs, and storage containers are functional because ;

  • there are so many uses
  • there is a huge variety of sizes
  • items come in many shapes
  • you will find lots of colours and embossed decor for special events
Porcelain
Annie Spratt

Favorite ceramic bowls are fun with many uses

Most people will recognize ceramic bowls as the most common ceramic item. There are many uses and many bowls and other items that are for specific uses.

Then there are many, many choices of mugs, serving bowls, platters, relish/pickle plates, pasta platters, soup bowls with lids that are often called “soup tureen” and of course we can’t forget the cookie jar and the coffee, tea, sugar and flour set.

Some of us will remember making pickles in a ceramic brine pot too.

shapes and colours

 There is a  huge variety of sizes and shapes

Ceramic items can be as small as a finger bowl to a brine pickle pot that holds 10 or more gallons of brine.

Bowls start as small as a dip dish that is 2″ wide by 1″ high. A large one can go as big as 20″ wide by 16″ high or more and every variation in between. Some bowls have a lip around the edge to enable putting a lid on.

The lid could be part of the bowl as a set or could be a material cover like saran or a waxed material cover called bees waxed reusable wraps. These would include round, square, rectangle, or any other shape used as the bowl.

Platters can be round, rectangle, square, triangle, random shapes. Sizes are from tiny individual type platters to very, very large. Some are sectioned off so that the food doesn’t mix with the other food. These too can have lips around the edge to use with a lid that comes as part of a set or to use with the beeswax reusable wraps.

Lots of colours and embossed items

Ceramic bowls were originally made of clay that was grey-beige in color when finished being made. Some would have stripes, most were plain. Company’s like Ohio ceramics and Portland are just two of many that have made bowls, platters, and many more products for many years.

colorful ceramics by mana

Now the bowls come in many, many colors and the outside of the bowl can be textured or have embossed items on it while the inside is smooth and one color.

You will see bowls and platters representing holiday themes and special events and even a specific bowl or plate for an item like strawberries or corn on the cob.

Platters with an embossed turkey nicely colored bowls embossed with Halloween ghosts and goblins or thanksgiving turkey, vegetables, and pumpkins are examples of this. The embossed items are very colorful to depict the special event that they are to be used for.

Today you can have plain original color, muted colors, bright colors even the inside color can be different from the outside.

Favorite ceramic bowls are fun!

Come share my journey of using ceramics. This is just the beginning of finding plates, bowls, platters, vases, containers, cups, and mugs. We will use these in our home as we replenish from living abroad.

It is a fun exciting journey!

 

 

  1. Hi Deb,

    Just like you Deb even my mom is in love with Ceramic products. We recently bought 16-piece round dinnerware set. I love this set! It’s beautiful. The bowls aren’t your standard curd bowls but soup/cereal/maggi bowls. We got the blue set. The best part about this set is that it doesn’t heat up in the microwave, so I’m able to pick up the plates and bowls with my bare hands. Thanks for sharing this post.

  2. Ahh, this sends me back to my childhood. We had a ceramic oven in the basement, and my mom would make all sorts of things while my dad was on the turntable, making bowls and vases β€” such beautiful art. We are currently traveling, but once we settle down in Australia, my wife and I will get some beautiful handmade ceramics again. Much nicer than the machine-made stuff. I especially love the ones when broken and glued together with gold. Is it Japan that does that? So pretty. πŸ™‚

  3. Hi Lovely

    Very interesting post on ceramic bowls. I love ceramic bowls, and have bought several, including, cups, casserole dish and platters. I agree that they β€œare both functional and decorative.”
    I love the colorful ones more than the plain ones. More than once, I have bought the sugar and flour set, one set was plain and the other was colorful.

    You really learned a lot about ceramic bowls, and did a great job in sharing the information. I learned some new information from reading your post, and believes that it will be very useful to individuals who reads it. They will definitely want to buy some ceramic bowls.

    I love your article about the lifestyle in Panama, and am sorry that things did not work out in your favor so that your husband and you could live there.

    All the best

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