Identifying pottery mark on lovely tea pot

[Valentineholt]

I have looked for hours with no luck it looks like a European 7 with an X in a box.
I could be looking at it wrong as well.

 

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[Red-Coat]

Welcome to Tnet

Nice teapot and not surprising you couldn’t find the mark if you were thinking it to be European. It’s a Japanese mark and, allowing for a little calligraphic style variation, it looks to be a Tashiro Shoten mark 田代 . I’ve inset the mark (one of several they used) alongside the mark on your piece below:



The company was started in 1878 by Tashiro Ichiroji in Nagoya, Japan as ‘Tashiroya’; was later known as ‘Tashiro Shoten’; and then ‘Tashiro & Co. Ltd’ until production stopped in 1954. They mainly produced porcelain for export, hand-painted in their Yokohama studio (although obviously not during the war years). Export pieces to America would have required additional marking with a country of origin but often this was achieved by an adhesive foil label (that could be subsequently peeled off).

I would think your teapot is from around the 1930s but that’s a guess based on the decorative style.

 

[Tony in SC]

Yes, It would have to be pre WWII.

 

[Red-Coat]

Yes, It would have to be pre WWII.

It doesn’t have to be. Japanese industries were rebuilt under occupation after the war ended, exports to the west resumed in the late summer of 1947 and, for Tashiro, continued until 1954 as I said.

The requirements under the McKinley Tariff Act for pieces to be marked in English with country of origin (initially "Occupied Japan" and then “Japan” after 1952) could be fulfilled by adhesive labels (usually metallic foil) rather than on the piece itself. There was a certain stigma in relation to Japanese goods for some time after the war ended. It wasn’t unusual for agents to ask for their goods to be marked via a sticker to allay any anti-Japanese sentiment, since the stickers could subsequently be removed.

I’m going by the decorative style rather than how the piece is marked.