Wonder if anyone here can help me this lovely Japanese vase I got at a tag sale recently. I paid under $5.00 for it. It seems to be very nice quality, it is porcelain, it looks to be celadon but I’m not sure. It has a lovely floral design. I’d like to know what it is & when it dates from. Even if it’s not valuable I’m still in love with it anyway. It’s beautiful. There is no damage on it at all. It’s about 10.5 inches tall. There is a red mark on the bottom that reads:
Micro Tokyo 1987. What does the large red symbol mean? Of course my first thought was that this meant it was made in Tokyo in 1987 in one of the porcelain factories or something. There was no “Made in Japan” sticker on it at all. Just the mark on the bottom which is unusual. If you look carefully, there is some kind of small blue Japanese mark or signature underneath the large red one, but I can’t make it out, but it’s definately there under the large red mark. I can read some Japanese, but the small blue marks under the large red one are too small for me to make out. There are two distinct blue characters under the large red seal. But I can’t make them out. I’d love to know more about it, when it dates from, etc. Maybe it’s from 1987, but I haven’t been able to find a single one like it anywhere on the internet. Thanks in advance for any assistance, I appreciate it! [img size=133]https://kovels.com/media/kunena/attachments/legacy/images/rsz_1rsz_4rsz_1rsz_005___copy.gif[/img]
Oh also, I noticed that the large red mark on the bottom appears to be stamped on after the fact, and the two small blue characters seem to be under the glaze. So it’s puzzling.
The piece kind of reminds me of Imari, but I don’t know enough about it to tell. I guess I’m hoping it’s a genuine antique from the Meiji period, if I had to guess, based on the sheen & condition, I’d say it was maybe early 20th century (maybe late 19th if I’m lucky).
But the red stamped mark, maybe it was a privately owned piece and then stamped for export? Or maybe it’s just a modern piece made for domestic but then marked for export. Hence the English. I wish I could read the blue characters.