Carl-Harry Stålhane (1920-1990) was born in 1920 in Mariestad, Sweden. Stålhane began working at Rörstrand in 1939 as a decorative painter, assisting Danish-Finnish ceramic artist, designer, and sculptor Gunnar Nylund. Quickly Stålhane went from being a talented decorator to an exceptional ceramic artist.
In the late 1940s he first attracted international attention with his designs for slender, symmetrical vessels in matte, monochromatic glazes, inspired by ancient Chinese ceramics from the Sung period. In 1958, Stålhane succeeded Nylund as Artistic Director and Chief Designer at Rörstrand. Stålhane eventually left Rörstrand in 1973 in order to establish his own ceramic company, Designhuset, in Lidköping, where he further experimented with local clays and minerals. Stålhane continued to work until his death in 1990. Today, Designhuset is a school for ceramists and model-makers.
