Hedwig Bollhagen (born in Hanover on 10 November 1907; died in Marwitz on 8 June 2001) was a German ceramicist and co-founder of the HB Workshops for Ceramics.

[2] After their closure due to a drop in exports as a result of the Great Depression, she began traveling: she first worked at the State Majolica Factory in Karlsruhe, then at the Rosenthal factories in Coburg, the workshop of Wilhelm Kagel in Garmisch-Partenkirchen (until the spring of 1932) and finally, as a "shop girl" in the "Kunst und Handwerk" ("Art and Craft") sales gallery led by Tilly Prill-Schloemann and Bruno Paul in Berlin until February 1933.

In 1935, Charles Crodel added the field of building ceramics to the company and, at the same time, brought to bear his industrial experience in decor development that he gained in the United Lusatian Glassworks when working together with Wilhelm Wagenfeld.

She became a ceramics master and was able to free the business from the grip of the German Labour Front (DAF), the National Socialist trade union organisation.

[3][4] In 1972, the workshops were nationalised, but even during the twenty years until it was finally re-privatised in 1992, Bollhagen remained its artistic director and continued to work there until shortly before her death.

Bollhagen's work was criticised by the East German head of state Walter Ulbricht, who considered her designs too formal and cosmopolitan.

[8][9][10] Triggered by an article in the rbb magazine Kontraste,[11] there was an intensified media debate in early 2008 regarding the extent to which Hedwig Bollhagen was the deliberate beneficiary of the so-called "Aryanization" of the Haël workshops.

The Jewish Claims Conference continues to abide by the 1981 compensation regime and confirms that the State Office responsible for settling still open property issues has denied that the sale was related to the persecution rife at the time.