ELCHINGER CERAMICS

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Céramiques Elchinger is  manufacture located in Soufflenheim in Alsace, which operated from 1834 to 2016. Before 1834, the company was a small tile factory founded by Michel Elchinger around 1792 on the same site.

Céramiques Elchinger is a family business that Wendelin Elchinger (1809-1895) founded in 1834 on the current site. He transformed the tile factory inherited from his father which was founded around 1792. The production was initially dedicated to culinary pottery. One of his sons, Philippe (1842-1906), took over and developed, from 1870, an outdoor ornamental pottery focused on garden and facade elements.

His son Léon Elchinger (1871-1942) left a remarkable artistic work.

In 1889, he was at the École des Beaux-Arts in Nancy; in 1890 in Germany at Höhr-Grenzhausen for the technical part. Until 1892, he toured France as a companion. From 1892 to 1893, the École supérieure des arts décoratifs in Strasbourg, where he was a student, entrusted him with the decoration of the facade of the new school. On this occasion, he created fabulous ceramic panels and thus signed, at the age of 21, his first work. He made many study trips to England, Hungary and Italy and returned to Soufflenheim to give new impetus to his workshops.

He launched into artistic ceramics. His works, in particular flamed stoneware, were very noticed at the beginning of the century during many international exhibitions. Several museums acquired them.

His son Fernand Elchinger (1911-1975) took over in 1936, developed and modernized the factory and built a second one in 1975 on another site. He installed the first six-pass continuous-fire electric kiln made in France and thus industrialized a production for earthenware.

Driven by the craze for Vallauris ceramics, the Alsatian manufacture achieved a strong reputation with its productions from the 1950s and 1960s. These creations, vases and pitchers with refined shapes, stood out from the exuberant creations of the workshops in the South.

From 1975 to the present day, the Elchinger dynasty is represented by Marc Elchinger. Production is resolutely oriented towards high-end tableware and home decor. Internationally renowned designers create colorful ranges that are always on trend. In addition, the company, which is very attached to its regional culture, has been publishing the original and exclusive versions of the watercolors of Jean-Jacques Waltz, known as "Hansi" for about fifteen years.

Thibaut Elchinger now represents the sixth generation of ceramists. The company has been called "Elchinger Couturier de la Terre" since 2008. The Céramiques Elchinger brand is still used for its licensed productions (Hansi, etc.) and other subcontracting and the Elchinger Couturier de la Terre brand for its contemporary collections.

The factory closed its doors for good on June 30, 2016 after more than 200 years of existence and eight generations.