Stoneware was the preferred medium for many ceramic artists working in France in the decades around 1900. It is more durable than earthenware and easier to form than porcelain, which is far less pliable. Furthermore, the temperatures at which stoneware is fired allow for spectacular glazing effects. Edmond Lachenal and his pupil Émile Decoeur were two of the many French ceramicists who learned to exploit the somewhat random and unpredictable qualities of stoneware glazes, which can produce highly mottled surfaces with pronounced variations in color and texture.

The complex and seemingly uncontrolled aspects of many of these glazes made them particularly appropriate for vessels in the Art Nouveau style, such as this example, in which naturalistic forms and asymmetries often prevailed. In this vase, probably by Decoeur, the organic quality imparted by the sinuous, tendril-like handles is reinforced by the richly mottled glaze, in which purples merge into grays of varying intensity. Despite the subtle sculptural quality of the vase, the glaze rather than the form creates the primary aesthetic impact.