The distinctive style of the Dulevo Porcelain Factory: agashki, krytye and centuries-old traditions

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Russia’s largest manufacturer of tableware and porcelain and faience products — the Dulevo Porcelain Factory — became a key destination during the visit of the team from the National Centre RUSSIA to the town of Likino-Dulyovo in the Moscow region. For almost two centuries, the factory’s products have remained a benchmark of quality. Durability, advanced manufacturing technologies and a wide range of painting techniques are the main secrets behind the success of the manufactory.

The porcelain factory in Dulyovo, in the Moscow Governorate, was founded in 1832 by Terenty Kuznetsov, the son of the enterprising peasant Yakov Kuznetsov. Within its first 20 years of operation, the enterprise became one of Russia’s leading porcelain producers. During the Soviet period, more than 6,500 people worked at the factory.

The factory grounds include the Church of St John the Theologian and a House of Culture. Near the factory building stands a monument to Matvey Kuznetsov, thanks to whom local porcelain gained worldwide recognition. The Dulevo Porcelain Factory was created for broad public use — so that every family could own porcelain.

According to Andrei Keller, Chairman of the production cooperative Dulevo Porcelain, Matvey Kuznetsov owned around ten factories and served as President of the European Association of Porcelain Manufacturers. In 1902, Kuznetsov received the title of Supplier to the Court of His Imperial Majesty, and in 1904 this status was confirmed as a mark of quality.

"Another porcelain factory is located near us. There is the Dulevo factory and there is the Kuznetsov factory — these are different enterprises, although they were located in close proximity. Kuznetsov owned ten factories: the Konakovo faience factory, factories in Riga, Warsaw and others. All of them were part of his ‘empire’," he said.

Matvey Kuznetsov, the grandson of the founder of the Dulevo Porcelain Factory, became a key figure in the enterprise’s history. It was under his leadership that the family business grew into a global brand and its products gained international fame. Thanks to his efforts, a full infrastructure developed around the factory, including industrial, residential and public buildings. The House of Culture, for example, was designed by architect Konstantin Melnikov, whose name is known worldwide. The club became the only building he designed outside Moscow. Later, from the 1990s onwards, the factory transferred a significant part of its social infrastructure to the town, including health resorts, kindergartens, 62 five-storey residential buildings, the House of Culture, a stadium, as well as greenhouse and auxiliary facilities.

The success of the Dulevo Porcelain Factory lies in the fact that from the very beginning, the painting of Dulevo porcelain was rooted in originality, folk art and national traditions. This gave rise to the unique Dulevo style known as "agashki". According to legend, the name comes from the female name Agafya: many peasant craftswomen at the factory bore this name, and it was they who were the first to depict the famous Dulevo roses with rounded petals. The masters carefully guarded the secrets of producing high-quality porcelain mass.

"Porcelain was always considered an expensive item and a sign of prosperity: it was handmade and accessible to very few. After the introduction of the New Economic Policy in the 1920s, shapes and decoration were simplified, and porcelain gradually became a mass product," Andrei Keller shared.

Artists at the Dulevo Porcelain Factory mastered recipes for rich pigments and the "krytye" painting technique, using vivid crimson, yellow, blue, pink cobalt shades and gold. The Dulevo pattern is created through a special brush positioning and confident, broad strokes, while a fine brush is used for detailed work on the petals.

Today, as Andrei Keller noted, the Dulevo factory is the only one in the country operating entirely on domestically sourced raw materials. All necessary supplies come from the Murmansk, Irkutsk, Chelyabinsk, and Ulyanovsk regions.

The factory employs more than 430 people, including 10 artists, 12 painters, five sculptors and two copyists. This is the largest hand-painting collective in Russia, he emphasised. The enterprise produces around 10 million items annually.

"There are many different porcelain designs. There is a tableware set I create — ‘Lily’. It rarely goes into production, but there is more creativity in it, so it comes straight from the heart. Over my 36 years here, I have painted a ‘whole railway carriage’ of items — a great many. For example, I have been painting one of the birds for about twelve years now, and there are quite a lot of them. I enjoy my work: it is demanding, but fascinating," said Yelena Shchitinina, an artist at the Dulevo Porcelain Factory.

The factory boasts an impressive collection of international awards. Its holdings include works that have received Grand Prix awards, as well as gold, silver and bronze medals from world exhibitions, including a diploma from the 1937 World Exhibition in Paris and a gold medal for the design "The Beauty", as well as top honours from the 1958 World Exhibition in Brussels, where the sculpture "Hen and Falcon" by Alexei Sotnikov received the Grand Prix. All these awards and original exhibits are part of the museum collection and attest to the international recognition of Dulevo porcelain.

The enterprise offers guided tours, during which visitors can learn about the production process and how porcelain is made, try their hand at a painting masterclass and spend time viewing museum exhibits. Today, the factory produces a wide range of items, including decorative vases, gift sets, tableware sets and products for the catering industry.

The National Centre RUSSIA and the Dulevo Porcelain Factory are linked by close cooperation that began during the International RUSSIA EXPO. The factory’s management was among the first to respond to the invitation to take part in the exposition. Today, items of the renowned Dulevo porcelain can be seen at the Department Store RUSSIA.