The first porcelain was mixed a few years later and although not perfect, the mixture of silica, kaolin, and flux vitrified at a very high temperature and set the foundation of the recipes we use today. The story of European porcelain started in the early 1700s when a young alchemist, Johann Böttger, held in captivity by the King of Saxony, made the first porcelain-like material from alabaster, a translucent and soft limestone, to which he added flux. At first there was just a curiosity about these objects, but when it became clear that only the very rich and most influential part of the population could afford this “white gold,” greed seeped in and everybody wanted it. It was so different from the red majolica pottery that was available in Europe. When Europeans were first exposed to porcelain in the early 12th century, it was simply the magic of the white and translucent objects that fascinated them. Fired at 2372☏ (1300☌), it had the ability to become very hard and durable, white, and translucent. Their porcelain was made from kaolin and petuntse, in essence exactly what porcelain is made of today, with the only difference that nature provided the perfect balanced materials to the Chinese potters. It took the Western world 2000 years to figure out how porcelain was made, because the Chinese succeeded in keeping their high-firing methods and materials a secret. To develop a porcelain clay body that will vitrify at a lower temperature (cone 6 versus cone 10), it is helpful to go back in history to reexamine the origin of porcelain to find out what makes it true porcelain. Few porcelains have exactly the right characteristics, but here are a few tips to get you a little closer. There is a constant striving by ceramic artists to improve the workability, color, and stability of porcelain clay bodies while also creating bodies that vitrify at cone 6.
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