A Vestal figure representing a priestess of Vesta, the Roman goddess of hearth and home, modeled by English sculptor, John Bacon (1740-1799) and produced by the Coade manufactory, the figure in contrapposto pose and draped in fringed classical robes, with proper right arm folded across her chest and proper left hand clutching her robes, her head and glance cast downward to her right, the hood upon her head revealing wavy tresses, English, ca. 1780. 



George Coade, his wife Eleanor, and their daughter Eleanor founded Coade’s Artificial Stone Manufactory in 1769. Assisted by renowned sculptor John Bacon (1740-1799), who was granted a Royal Appointment to King George III in 1769, the younger Eleanor (1733-1821) became the driving force behind the company, making the first weather-hardy artificial stone that was more durable, less expensive and more efficient to produce than carved stone. Their proprietary product, Coade stone, a unique mixture that contained crushed flint, fine quartz, soda lime glass and ball clay, was kiln-fired twice for durability. The Coade manufactory produced classically inspired architectural features for more than 150 British architects, among them Robert Adam (1728-1792) and Sir John Soane (1753-1837). Examples of Coade’s work are on the finest structures and in the most superior gardens in England, many of them royal commissions, including The Royal Pavilion in Brighton, St. George’s Chapel at Windsor, and Buckingham Palace. Representative of the firm’s earliest products, this Vestal figure appears in the Coade manufactory catalogs beginning in the early 1770s, and was exhibited at the Society of Artists Exhibition in 1774. When, in 1799, John Bacon died, Eleanor (the younger) made her cousin, John Sealy, a partner, establishing “Coade & Sealy”. Upon Mr. Sealy’s death in 1813, Eleanor hired a distant relation, William Croggon, to manage the day-to-day operations at the manufactory. Eleanor Coade died in 1821, but Croggon maintained a robust business until he went bankrupt in 1833 for reasons that are not entirely understood. Nevertheless, the Coade name was carried on by the two lessees of the property, John Danforth Greenwood and Thomas Routledge. In 1836 Mark Blanchard purchased the bulk of Coade’s molds and patterns, carrying on under his own name the impeccable quality and durability of Coade’s artificial stone.