[Photo by Jiang Dong/China Daily]

Rise and fall

The small county has basked in the rise and wallowed in the fall of the ceramics industry.

Chen Mingliang, a Chinese arts and crafts master and national inheritor of the Dehua ceramics technique, says that, during the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644), the techniques used to create Dehua ceramics reached a peak with porcelain being produced as white as cream.

"That was why the French named Dehua-made, ivory white porcelain 'Blanc de Chine' 300 years ago, a title that is still used today," says Chen. Highly-coveted by European nobles, Dehua white porcelain sparked the production of porcelain in Europe.

"Then, during the Qing Dynasty, because of the huge overseas demand for Chinese porcelain utensils, the fine art of blanc de Chine porcelain production gradually waned, as craftsmen turned to the mass production of blue-and-white porcelain utensils for export," explains Chen.

The Tek Sing ceramics are evidence of those mass exports, he says.