Fake & Repro Marks:
[1] : WL1895 a.k.a. Wong Lee Productions Co. a.k.a. Wa(h) Lee
The WL1895-mark was the first obscure mark I encountered after starting to develop my interest in porcelain. Some of the items offered were very high-priced and most of them came with a gut-wrenching background story, most of them actually mentioned some 'William Lowe Pottery' that existed long ago in England and was (or still is) claimed to be the manufacturer of these products. All pictures of the mark I encountered showed it perfectly stamped and colored, something that was impossible to achieve during the alledged production period that also contradicted with the coloring and overall design of these items. To cut a long story short, these 'antiques' are actually modern items made recently in China.
There is more behind it, however. On one hand I am extremely proud to have been able to really kick up dirt into the faces of some scammers by being the first to openly claim these items were reproductions. On the other hand, the 'Wong Lee' story also was a wonderful lesson for me: after some basic research, the background history until then was that the mark represented a subsidiary of the 'Wong Lee International Co.' - the 'Wong Lee Productions Co.' was claimed to have been founded in 1995 and started to export around 1999. So far I was told, the date '1895' was choosen in commemoration of the end of the war between Japan and China exactly 100 years before the Wong Lee Productions Co was founded ... but that background was far from flawless as I learned later.
The 'Wong Lee International Co.' clothing company founded in 1976 is not related with the 'Wong Lee Productions Co.' and someone else also correctly pointed out that 'Wong Lee' is as common as 'John Smith'. Then a few people mentioned it could rather be either 'Wa Lee' or 'Wah Lee' (depending on who actually translated it from Chinese) and tried to link the mark up to the 'Wa Lee Pottery' - which never made such items and on top of that had already closed around 1968. At that point, a guy Bob Hudson published an article on his homepage and started to take apart the 'Wong Lee' theory, making a blazing effort to bring up William Lowe and his partner Tam in line with the reproductions. He went through quite a stretch trying to prove that the 'pro-Wong-Lee' sites and especially myself were wrong and at one point I actually asked myself which factory was paying him.
Finally the whole business really started to pick up speed. I had mentioned to know quite a few items that backed my claims and up until then the pro-antiques fraction defending their 'antiques' codswallop had claimed that these items only existed in my twisted mind. Alas, people had started to check my findings and by then, more and more people were able to verify my claims, suddenly coming up with freshly imported WL1895-marked objects carrying 'Made in China' stickers or even impressed Chinese additions; also items with the WL1895 mark from much later periods than poor Lowe and Tam could ever have made, like for example Art Deco vases. In the end somebody working for a certain import company mentioned that indeed these items came from China via Hong Kong. Soon afterwards, two eBay PowerSellers (by now both NARU'd for other incidents) suddenly removed all their WL1895 items from their stores.
Thanks to some extremely helpful and observant eBay 'Pottery, Glass & Porcelain' board members I was able to inform many people about my findings and many regulars took it into their own hands and informed other websites about the 'WL1895' scam. I will gladly admit that my initial background findings were far from perfect, but what really counts is that these items are not antique, no matter what somebody tries to tell you. The facts remain: WL1895 items are not 'William Lowe' antiques but modern reproductions made in China. I personally don't give a damn on who actually made them or what the company is (or was) called - these items are MODERN CHINESE REPRO JUNK.
[2] : JBT1906
I learned a lot through this case and the publication of the discoveries ruined quite a few scams, but apparently that was not enough for the person behind these items because a new mark was found on items that normally are seen with the WL1895 mark. It could be either a successor mark used by the same company or the same items are now produced for another export business. Who cares? Fact is that the new mark (designated 'JBT1906', see below) is just as bogus as the 'WL1895' mark. As Mr. George H.M.J. Mulders informed me in August 2009, these items are sometimes offered as being made by the (of course non-existant) company 'JBT Ceramics' from near Amsterdam (Netherlands).
Marks
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