Do you want to be a food photographer? Do you enjoy hosting dinner parties? If the answer to either of these questions is yes, you may need to consider what you are placing your food upon. Both entertaining and photography with food require the best presentation possible. Part of the visual you will provide with the food is the crockery.

What are crockery items? Crockery is often defined as your everyday ceramic tableware. These are the dishes that sit on your table at every meal. To give you a better understanding, we look at what the term 'crockery' entails and the typical composition of these items.

• Plates

• Bowls

• Cups

• Serving Platters

Types of Crockery

Looking around your home you may ask yourself, what are crockery items? What are common crockery items made of? Often, the materials used are porcelain, earthenware, and stoneware. Bone china can also be considered crockery, though more often than not when one speaks about crockery they are referring to the dishware they would use daily. Knowing what are crockery items in your home and what they are made of can help you make better decisions towards the purchase and investment in higher quality dishware.

• Bone china is commonly used in restaurants because it is lightweight and this makes it easy for waitresses to carry multiple plates at once.

• Stoneware is resistant to chips, scratches, and stains though it can be coarse to the touch unless glazed.

• Porcelain can be glazed or patterned, giving the crockery in your home a unique feel. A bonus to these dishes is durability. Most porcelain is dishwasher, microwave, and freezer-safe.

• Earthenware, while almost as versatile in the home as porcelain, can be prone to chipping due to its porous nature. This type of crockery is best suited to handwashing.

What to Consider Before Buying

When you look around your home and take into account what crockery you will need you also want to look at several other factors such as:

• Utility - What are crockery items? How will you be using them? This is an area of your home you may want to spend a bit of money in. Dishes should be an investment in something of medium to high quality.

• Shape and Color - Somebody who entertains often may favor an interesting shape of crockery. Others prefer simple dishes to serve their meals on. If you like to take pictures of your meals and share them consider what color will make the food stand out.

• Durability -  What are crockery items? At its basic definition crockery is your everyday dishware. Crockery must be life-proof and long-lasting.

What are Crockery Items?

Crockery items are the dishes you will use daily or almost everyday. Crockery is your plates, bowls, cups, and serving platters. A wide variety of crockery is produced, some using materials from hundreds of years ago and others more modern. With such a wide variety there are many decisions to make when considering what crockery items you wish to invest in.