Tiffany Studios began its first forays into the production of Art Pottery shortly after Louis Comfort Tiffany returned from the 1900 Exposition Universelle in Paris, inspired by the innovative glazes and naturally derived forms of the French Art Nouveau ceramicists. After several years experimentation with formulas, glazes and forms, Tiffany Studios unveiled their Favrile Pottery at the 1904 World’s Fair in St. Louis. The company produced Favrile Pottery until around 1915.
Though Louis Comfort Tiffany was officially named as the artistic genius behind the work, recent scholarship has revealed that Favrile Pottery was mostly designed by a select group of “Tiffany Girls" who were largely isolated in a specialized studio housed at Tiffany’s large complex in Corona, Queens. Though these young women were never credited with their work, surviving sketches and records identify Alice Gouvy, Lillian Palmié, and Edith Lautrup as three of the influential artists in the department.
Clara Driscoll enviously referred to the pottery and enamel department as “Little Arcadia." As Manager of the Women's Glass Cutting Department, located in Tiffany Studios' more commercially minded Manhattan building, Driscoll was frequently forced to set aside her artistic desires in the name of the financial interests of the company. Unlike Driscoll, the women of "Little Arcadia" were known to exercise great artistic freedom under Tiffany’s direction. The walls of their workspace were were plastered with delicate watercolor studies of the seed pods, flowers, and dried leaves that would go on to adorn vases or rare enamels.
"There they sit with snow-covered trees out of the windows and beautiful studies on the walls, and vases of seed pods and dried leaves and everything both in nature and art."
- Clara Driscoll, 1902 letter describing the working environment of Tiffany's pottery and enamel department
