The Satellites: Communist Meissen Ware

In the old days, when the rulers of Europe faced a balance-of-payments problem, they turned not to economists but to alchemists, who always seemed to be just on the verge of discovering how to turn base metal into gold. In 1709, Johann Friedrich Böttger, an alchemist employed by Augustus the Strong, Elector of Saxony and King of Poland, hit upon something almost as good as gold: using wig powder as a base, he produced Europe’s first true porcelain. To keep the secret, Augustus shut Böttger up in a dank castle in the Saxon village of Meissen and told him to produce china without ever letting any single employee learn the entire formula.

Ever since, the translucent, richly decorated porcelain turned out by the Meissen works has been one of Europe’s most prized and best-paying products.

Nowadays Meissen is earning funds for another hard-pressed ruler. At the close of World War II, the shattered Meissen factory fell to the Soviets, who—while carting off so many other factories as “reparations”—shrewdly set about getting the porcelain works back into production as quickly as possible. Though workers in other East German plants have usually been bullied and ideologically “reformed” by Communist bosses, the 900 Meissen workers have been left in relative peace to do their jobs in the painstaking traditional way. As a result, while most East German goods are hopelessly shoddy, Meissen china has retained its traditional quality, commands a steep price wherever it is sold, e.g., a twelve-place dinner setting of the bestselling “Blue Onion” design costs $500 in New York. Next to optical products and cameras, Meissen is East Germany’s best hard-currency earner.

G.I.s learned about Meissen when it was a major barter item on the German black market immediately after the war and transmitted a taste for it (as well as whole cases of it) to their families back home. Recently sales of new Meissen to the U.S. and other Western countries have slackened. Hemmed in by Communist artistic canons, the company has failed to turn out successful modern designs, instead relies on old patterns which contemporary Westerners find too rococo.

But at least one new market is opening up. West German industrialists doing business in the new African states have found that Meissen vases are highly prized there. The vases are costly ($500-$1,500) and usually are decorated with goddesses cavorting among wispy pink clouds. No prudent German businessman these days would think of leaving for Africa without stowing a few in his luggage to ease his way through negotiations.