STEIN-KERAMIK FLOOR VASE 401/40

A gorgeous XL '70s-era handled floor vase with a drippy, glossy red fat-lava top glaze on a matte black, pumice-like undercoat produced by STEIN-KERAMIK.  This design was previously thought to have been produced by JOPEKO, but new research has ascribed it—and some other very popular shapes and glazes—to STEIN.  STEIN-KERAMIK's place among mid-century West German pottery manufacturers is being reassessed accordingly.  The mark is 401/40; Egon Klein is probably the designer.

STEIN-KERAMIK was based in the small town of Ransbach-Baumbach in West Germany in an area crowded with ceramic manufacturers.  Many of its designs are by former owner Egon Klein who joined the company in 1956 and took it over with his wife ten years later.  STEIN-KERAMIK items are often misattributed to Jopeko.

The brand name seems to have been abandoned entirely by about 2009.  By that time STEIN was operating as a trade company rather than a manufacturer.  Currently the company markets ceramic urns of German production under the name FEUER UND ERDE (Fire and Earth).