A goblet with a painted landscape scene associated with Mary Beilby, c. 1770.

Mary Beilby (c. 1750 – 1797) was an enameller and glass-painter in the Beilby glassware family.

She was baptised in Durham in 1750, the youngest child of William Beilby senior, a silversmith, and his wife Mary Bainbridge, a schoolteacher. Her six siblings included William, Ralph, and Thomas. By 1760, the family had moved to Gateshead, where Ralph set up Beilby & Co., using William’s expertise from his apprenticeship as an enameller.[1]

Mary joined the family business at a young age: when Thomas Bewick joined the Beilby workshop as an apprentice in 1776, he reported that William "taught his brother Thomas and sister Mary enamelling and painting; and, in this way, this most respectable and industrious family lived together and maintained themselves."[2] They would purchase glass vessels and paint them in their home,[3] which Bewick said was Mary and Thomas's "constant employment." Bewick’s memoir reports a secret attachment to Mary, which he felt he could not act on due to her family’s contemptuous treatment of him.

In 1774, Bewick records that "Miss Beilby had a paralytic stroke, which very greatly altered her look, and rendered her for some time unhappy."[2] Sometime after 1788, she moved to Fife to join William and his wife there. She died in 1797.[1]

Beilby ware involves fine enamelled designs on glass including rococo flourishes, landscape vignettes, and heraldic designs.[4] Although Mary’s contribution is acknowledged, it is difficult to identify exactly which pieces she decorated.[5]

References

  1. 1 2 "Beilby family (per. c. 1755–1819), glass enamellers and engravers". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/9780198614128.001.0001/odnb-9780198614128-e-73669#odnb-9780198614128-e-73669-headword-4 (inactive 2023-12-02). Retrieved 2023-11-25.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: DOI inactive as of December 2023 (link)
  2. 1 2 Bewick, Thomas. "A Memoir of Thomas Bewick Written by himself". Project Gutenberg. Retrieved 2023-11-25.
  3. ↑ admin (2017-03-05). "The Decorated Glass of William and Mary Beilby". World Collectors Net. Retrieved 2023-11-25.
  4. ↑ "Beilby Glass". Antiques Trade Gazette. Retrieved 2023-11-25.
  5. ↑ Cottle, Simon, 'Enamelled Glass: The Beilbys Recollected,' Apollo 129 (1989), p. 398; Cottle, Simon, "William Beilby and the Art of Glass,' The Glass Circle Journal 9 (2001), p. 34.
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