Wallendorf is/was the name of the area where the orginal factory established by J W Hammann was located in Thuringia. The factory was closed and reopened numerous times thru the years due to changes in ownership, political upheavels, and export restrictions. March 30, 1764 is the date when Duke Franz Josias officially granted the concession for porcelain making to the factory at Wallendorf, hence the 1764 under the crown. Factory was sold to a syndicate headed by Christian Hutschenreuther in 1838, hence the similarity of many Hutschenreuther designs to Wallendorf. In 1932 after a bankruptcy, the factory was purchased by Heinz Schaubach and the Schaubach Kunst crown was introduced. Also in bankruptcy at the time was the Unter Weiss Bach porcelain mark, and upon breakup, Schaubach acquired a majority piece of that company, resurrecting that mark and producing designs from both companies at the Wallendorf factory.   In 1953 the factory was "nationalized" or taken over by the communist East German government and the Schaubach Kunst mark replaced once again with the Wallendorf "Crown W", eliminating reference to the previous private ownership which was not allowed under the communist rule. The Crown W is still the mark used today, with only slight variation from the original.  The older Wallendorf marks are very dark green, olive, or black, sometimes with "Germany" underneath the 1764. Recently made pieces have a mark which is green or bright green, and have script wording in German underneath. Most often, when a seller claims not to know the age of the piece, it means it is a new one, and he does not want to tell you, since the new ones bring less than the vintage pieces for obvious reasons.    I have recently noticed some auction descriptions claiming the factory is no longer in business.  I have not had time to investigate, but I still have one of their catalogs from about 8 years ago at which time they were apparently still very much in business.  If anyone has additional info on this, I would be pleased to hear from them, and will add any updates I get.

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