While changing markets and overseas competition threaten the existence of the major ceramic factories in Stoke-on-Trent, one of the few that thrives and prospers is Portmeirion, the brainchild of Susan Williams-Ellis, who has died at the age of 89.
A gifted artist and designer, she acquired a factory in the late 1950s, and from the start followed her own, often unconventional, ideas and ways of working, ignoring practical advice from experienced, if conservative, pottery managers, who assured her that such processes could not be done. Undeterred, she went ahead, and with her husband Euan Cooper-Willis led a creative company that became the envy of the manufacturing giants in Stoke.
Eccentricity was a significant part of Williams-Ellis's background. Her father, Sir Clough Williams-Ellis, was a wealthy, largely self-taught architect, who, on a whim, acquired a peninsula on the north Wales coast, where he designed and built Portmeirion, a village in the Italianate style. While never claiming to be great architecture, it is colourful, charming and atmospheric.
In tune with the liberal eccentricity of her parents, Susan was sent to Dartington Hall school, in Devon, a bold experiment in radical education, where students were allowed not only to choose what to study but whether to study at all. Here she learned pottery under the eye of Bernard, and then David, Leach. This was followed by a spell studying art at what was then the Chelsea Polytechnic, where her tutors included Henry Moore and Graham Sutherland. The experience affirmed her abilities as an artist.
Being at home with the bohemian lifestyle, Williams-Ellis lived an almost self-sufficient life on a north Wales farm with her husband, an eminent economist, developing her career as a designer while he cared for their children. The opportunity to put her ideas into practice came with the invitation from her father to design pots for the loss-making gift shop at Portmeirion. Blanks were purchased from Kirkham's factory in Stoke and decorated at AE Gray Ltd, a company specialising in lustre. Feeling the need for more control over production, in 1960 Susan and Euan bought Gray's and, the following year, Kirkham's. Gray's employees moved into the Kirkham's factory, which was renamed Portmeirion Potteries. Although neither she nor her husband knew anything about producing ceramics or managing a factory - which still used labour-intensive traditional bottle kilns that took two weeks to fire and another two to cool down - they were undeterred. While the usual role for women in the industry was as decorators, Susan was now able to produce both shape and decoration - her aim was to design attractive ware at a reasonable price. Despite their inexperience, the factory was a success.
Following her instinct early designs included Malachite (1960) and Moss Agate (1961). Although neither were produced in quantity, they received critical acclaim. Her next designs featured unusually bright, floral images (Portmeirion Rose and Tiger Lily) and genuine commercial success came with the iconic Totem design in 1963. With its bold, abstract relief pattern of spirals and stars, coupled with striking cylindrical shapes and richly coloured transparent glaze, the coffee pots, cups and saucers, cream jugs and sugar bowls captured the alternative mood of the times - relaxed, informal and friendly. While experienced hands said that this sort of ware could not be produced because it would introduce too many variables, it proved an enduring bestseller.
The next big break came with Botanic Garden, a range still in production today. Attracted by the beauty of the botanical illustrations in Thomas Green's The Universal Or Botanical, Medical and Agricultural Dictionary (1817), Susan applied them as prints on tableware. Undaunted by the cost of producing a transfer that might involve 15 colours - again in defiance of expert advice - she went ahead. The results were among the finest transfers ever made, and the range proved a runaway success. Botanic Garden became a byword for casual dining, and has now acquired classic status.
While most owners were rarely seen on the factory floor, Williams-Ellis, wearing an old-fashioned overall, was happy to be among the turners, fettlers and glazers turning a new shape on the lathe. If packers were in short supply, she would lend a hand. On one occasion, suffering from a bad back, she followed medical advice to lie flat on the factory floor to rest every two hours, much to the amazement of the workers.
She held weekly staff meetings in her bedroom, sometimes wearing a nightgown in turquoise, her favourite colour. Needless to say, she had a loyal and devoted workforce. In an industry in which, with the exception of Clarice Cliff and Susie Cooper, women were seen as having a limited role, the entrepreneurial success of Williams-Ellis was unprecedented. Recognition came with an honorary fellowship from the University of Arts, London, and an honorary degree from Keele University for her outstanding contribution to the ceramics industry. "I decided to pursue pottery, rather than painting," she said, "mainly because I wanted to create affordable and beautiful things."
Williams-Ellis is survived by her husband, her sister Charlotte Wallace, daughters Anwyl, Siân and Menna, son Robin and 11 grandchildren. Although Portmeirion is now a public company, the family is still deeply involved with it; Anwyl is marketing and design director, and Menna a designer.
· Susan Williams-Ellis, potter and businesswoman, born June 6 1918; died November 27 2007