Etruria Works

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The Etruria Works was a ceramics factory opened by Josiah Wedgwood in 1769 in a district of Stoke-on-Trent, Staffordshire, England, which he named Etruria. Wedgwood had previously based his business in the nearby town of Burslem at the Ivy House Works and the Brick House Works.

In 1767 Wedgwood paid about three thousand pounds for his new site, which was then known as the Ridgehouse Estate. It lay directly in the path of the Trent and Mersey Canal of which Wedgwood was a promoter. On one side of the canal Wedgwood built a large house, Etruria Hall and on the other side a factory. His architect was Joseph Pickford.

The motto of the Etruria works was Artes Etruriae Renascuntur. This may be translated from the Latin as "The Arts of Etruria are reborn". Wedgwood was interested in the ancient pottery collected by Sir William Hamilton, which was at the time attributed to the Etruscans. The modeller John Flaxman was able to adapt these classical designs for the eighteenth-century market. The products of Wedgwood's factory were greatly admired in Britain and abroad. Some of Flaxman's designs are still in production today.

Little remains of the factory today, although one surviving structure is now protected as a listed building [1]. The site was affected by mining subsidence, and most of the factory was demolished after the Wedgwood company moved production to Barlaston some miles south on the Trent and Mersey Canal. Part of the site is now occupied by The Sentinel.