I love the clean styling of Beth Mueller’s ceramics. Each item is hand painted, glazed in white, and usually adorned with some sort of short message or word. If you visit her website, you will see a large selection of items she has to offer, to include vases, dishes, and vessels of all shape and size. She also makes paper and cloth products too.

Beth studied art in college, but also studied print making in Italy and apprenticed to a potter in Detroit. Wherever her training comes from though, the combination is brilliant; she produces strikingly simple yet elegant pieces.

I really like her children’s eating sets, such as the one shown, and her counter-top compost bin and asparagus platter.

Her pieces would make great gifts for almost any occasion and can be found at several sites online. Some places to check out are Uncommon Goods, Zanisa, and Artful Home, and you can even purchase her milk bottle vases through Amazon.

These metal utensils from the Italian company, Italesse, are stylish, recyclable and pack up well. The aluminum flatware was designed by Tomas Alonso and takes up minimal space while being exceptionally light weight. For some good pictures go to Alonso’s site linked above, click on ’stamp cutlery’, and then click at the bottom to see more images. The story about the design process is pretty interesting to read through too.

These utensils simply stack on top of each other, and there is a little clip that holds the spoon, fork, and knife together for organization. They sort of remind me of the utensils from an old Army mess kit that I have, but these look much nicer. They’d definitely be perfect for camping or some outdoor entertaining. Alonso bills them as reusable/disposable, but the designer also hopes that people will use them more than once. Regardless, this is disposable flatware to be proud of.

Unfortunately, I cannot find these products for sale in the US or Europe, but hopefully Italesse will roll them out soon and some vendor in the US will pick them up.

I really like the simple, elegant look of the Crudo tableware line from Atipico out of Italy. It is the product of five designers in search of simple, honest eating integrated with the grace of earthy materials. ‘Crudo’ means ‘raw’ in Italian and is an apt name for the tableware line. A description in the catalog says, “The strength of invisible fire bakes the matter while leaving its meaning raw and intact.” I kind of like that, and the black clay earthiness of some of the pieces definitely gives that feeling.

I particularly like the covered bowl set and the oblong serving platter with white glaze. As summer is on its way, I could see many uses for the covered bowl and the platter begs to have a grilled side of halibut on it.

Now comes the hard part: waiting. I can’t find this available for sale, and I am not sure if it is in commercial production yet. The line was just introduced in January 2010 and was in this month’s issue of Wallpaper*, so maybe later in the year it will start to come out in Europe and after that in the US.

I have been a fan of Paul Smith’s iconic colorful stripes for a while, and now you can get some expensive bone china to bring that color to the table. To the right is the breakfast cup and saucer of his, and one setting will cost $135. You can check out his coffee and tea service sets at paulsmithusa.com. Just click on the online shop and you will be redirected to the UK online shop. A set of four coffee cups, creamer, and coffee pot will run you $900+.

This table manners set comes from Japan, and it won’t necessarily work for other cultures that don’t have that range of utensils, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t a good idea.

The set has icons to identify which item is used for what, and it will create some sort of visual model for setting the table when the little ones grow up. Plus kids will love it.

The item is available on Funfam if you can figure out how to buy it.

These animal plates from J.K. Adams are rather interesting. They are made out of Vermont maple and have a different animal engraved onto each one. They would be great picnic options, serving platters for meats and cheeses, or just to use as kids plates.

Please note, however, that since the plates are wood, they are not dishwasher safe.

One plate will cost $25 and a set of eight will run you $190, but one or two would definitely be nice for serving plates. You can purchase them from The Kitchen Store at J.K. Adams.

The Italian company, Guzzini, has a long tradition of making quality, design-oriented kitchen goods. You can browse their site to see a lot of interesting products, but unfortunately it is very hard to find their kitchen and home goods here in the US.

You can try to search on eBay to find selected items, but for the most part you are going to have to search high and low to find a place to do your shopping. I especially liked the Dolce Vita glasses (to the right), their gelato cups, and the salad spinner.

Photo by Michael Kraus

The November issue of Saveur featured an article on the tableware store out of North Carolina called Replacements. This store started out as a flea market passion of owner Bob Page, who enjoyed finding hard-to-find missing dishes and flatware pieces for sets, and it now serves as a clearing house for replacement dishes of every variety and brand. So if you are looking to find a broken glass or plate from your Grandmother’s heirloom china or crystal set, then this is the place to go. I just did a search on a set I have at home and found replacement pieces available at very reasonable prices.  At least now I know where to go if something breaks.

The store has over 300,000 patterns available, but even if what you are looking for isn’t in stock, you can request that they find it and you will receive a notification when it comes in. The website is basic and functional but not that great for browsing. I did go through the ’specials’ section and found the ‘Unique Tableware Sets to Go‘ to be useful to browse. You can essentially buy entire 40+ piece settings of fine tableware from $200 to $2400. A good number of the sets are already sold, but I am sure there are some good deals to be found.

The downside of the website is that it can be rather overwhelming. The sheer number of brands, styles, and patterns — while impressive — is daunting to say the least. I would love for them to have different search capabilities for retro, solid colors, modern, floral and other style preferences. Another good search option would be to only search dinnerware that is in stock. There are no doubt thousands of hidden gems in their inventory, but it is like finding a needle in a haystack with the current website design.

With that said, if you are looking to create an eclectic, out-of-the-ordinary table setting or want to find some retro dinnerware, then with a bit of effort you will be able to achieve this through Replacements. And when you need something specific or hard to find, this should be the first place to look. I also decided to test out the e-mail request service and put in some orders to find Lobmeyr crystal wine and water glasses. These items cost around $140 a piece, so it will be interesting to see if they find them and at what price they will be marked. None were currently in stock, so I’ll let you know what comes of it.

The Argentinian designer, Alfredo Häberli, based out of Zurich, Switzerland has designed some beautiful home and kitchen products for many companies. Most of his work is furniture, but I love his simple yet colorful dishes that he designed for Iittala. If you like bistro tableware that is plain white, but are also looking for some color, the Origo line designed by Häberli is a fun option.

Starting 2 January, The Conran Shop is having a sale on his dinnerware with pieces marked down about 30 percent. You can also purchase the Origo line from Didrik’s for comparable prices and they also offer free shipping.

And even if you don’t want to go for the whole dish set because of expense, you can always opt for a serving dish or two to add some color.

I’ve been trolling eBay lately trying to find some vintage Stig Lindberg porcelain pieces. They often fetch pretty high prices, but I love the simple Nordic design of the Bersa line (to the right).

Stig Lindberg was one of the most prominent ceramic designers in post-war Sweden, and back in 2006 the National Museum of Sweden had an exhibit showcasing his designs and work. Stig Lindberg died in 1982, but his patterns are timeless and his pieces would be a great addition if one wants some unique, classic-design tableware. Of course, the pattern isn’t so unique in Sweden, but outside of Scandinavia Lindberg pieces have a cult following of sorts. There are several interesting auctions on eBay right now, but I will have to see how outrageous the prices get.

I also love the Lindberg sets that have the simple food motif on them. To the right is one example, and I hope to see some of these on eBay in the future. Someone seriously needs to remake this style for a new dinnerware set. You can see a couple other examples of this design at the 50 Danska Kvadrat blog.

As for my eBay purchase, I won a couple of serving platters. And now that the auction is done I can safely post this entry.