William Adams (potter)

This Adams founded the Greengates Pottery in 1779, producing fine jasperware table sets, plaques, medallions and other products stamped Adams & Co.[3] He is said to have been a friend and confidant of Josiah Wedgwood during their entire lives, including the time when both were experimenting with jasperware.

Adams has often been credited with improving on Josiah's original formula in colour, design, and stability while he worked at the Etruria Factory.

This influence is said to have directly contributed to Wedgwood's success, before the period when Adams was working independently at Greengates.

[1] Other sources make him a "favourite pupil" and life-long "confidant" of Josiah Wedgwood.

[1] Adams died in 1805, and his prosperous business was taken over by his younger son Benjamin; the business closed in 1820[1] in part due to Benjamin's ill health and was sold in 1826 to John Meir, but in 1897 was sold back to another branch of the Adams family, and was finally absorbed into the Wedgwood Group in 1966.