These simple, round salad plates represent one variant of Minton's "Aquarium" pattern, designed by William Coleman, one of Minton's premier artists of the aesthetic period.

In this study of an impressive lobster Coleman combines several traits learned from the Japanese: the high horizon line, the use of simple means to suggest an environment, and a fascination for the ominous, perhaps grotesque, aspects of nature. Floating among some horizontal ripples, the lobster presents his threatening claws which throw his perhaps equally threatening eyes into shadow. The bottom half of the plate simply provides space for his dangling legs and feelers.

While many transfer patterns appealed to the aesthetic consumer by simply incorporating Japanese motifs, Coleman penetrates deeply into the Japanese mode of capturing nature in these aquatic studies. He defies the western tradition of nature depiction and china decoration, filling the plates with asymmetrical, spontaneous, unconventionally close-up views. The placement of the drawings on the plate is unprecedented in transferware. While "Aquarium" was produced in may variations, this blue version, with a hint of flow in the heavy printing, effectively conveys the quality of an Asian ink brush study.