We have a large selection of Royal Copenhagen Christmas plates available. Please refer to the drop-down list above for the years we have in stock.
The history of the Danish Christmas plate began in 1888 at the Nordic Industrial, Agricultural and Arts Exhibition in Copenhagen. Held in and around Tivoli Gardens, the exhibition would host 1.3 million guests, more than 50% of the population of Denmark at the time. The Royal Danish Porcelain Factory (Royal Copenhagen) created a series of plates that lined the podiums used for display. The plates were decorated with the factory logo - the crown representing the royal stamp with three waves symbolizing Denmark's three straits: Storebælt, Lillebælt and Øresund. Crown Princess Louise of Denmark, attending the fair, purchased a plate as a keepsake which plate was left on display at the fair with a note. The note caused a trend, as visitors to the fair quickly acquired the remaining plates. Having run out of supply, the factory produced more to meet demand, and with this success they recognized that plates could be reproduced to mark special occasions and events. In the years that followed Royal Copenhagen created collectable plates to mark events in relation to the Danish Royal family.
It was at almost the same time that an artist working for the Royal Danish Porcelain Factory, Frans August Hallin, was working on a way to carve a relief into a plate mould in order to repeat decoration en masse. By creating a depth of relief, the plate could be flooded with glaze and the deeper areas would appear darker. In 1895 he left for the rival firm Bing and Grondahl.
It was Harald Bing, the owner of Bing and Grondahl, who decided to create a collector’s plate for annual occasions, with a new design each year. Launching the first Christmas plate in 1895, using Frans August Hallin’s relief idea. Royal Copenhagen followed suite with their own Christmas plate thirteen years later in 1908. The two firms merged in 1987 but both series of Christmas plates have continued to be produced each year.
