A dessert service is a matching set of plates and serving dishes made for the final course of a formal meal, when fruit, sweetmeats, ices and nuts were served. A typical service includes a number of dessert plates together with comports or tazze, shaped dishes in various sizes, and sometimes sauce tureens, cream bowls and ice pails.
Dessert services became an important part of fashionable dining in the eighteenth century, when the dessert was often presented with elaborate centrepieces and porcelain figures. English factories including Derby, Worcester, Coalport, Spode, Minton and Swansea produced superb examples, frequently painted with botanical subjects, landscapes, birds or fruit, sometimes with each piece showing a different named specimen or view. Victorian services could be very elaborate, with pierced borders, raised gilding and richly coloured grounds. Because dessert services were used less often than dinner services, they frequently survive in good condition. Collectors value complete or substantial services, fine painting, identifiable artists, crisp gilding and clear factory marks, while wear to the gilt, cracks or replacements reduce value. Individual plates also make attractive wall displays.
