Given the number of surviving pieces one encounters--and the number of patterns that imitate the design--"Melbourne" must have been an exceptionally popular pattern. No wonder; the pattern seems to have been calculated to appeal to a wide range of aesthetic era consumers. For the breakfast-table traveler, "Melbourne" offered a fantasy glimpse of a far off seaside bamboo grove, complete with happy song birds. The more sophisticated aesthete could take satisfaction in the rich variety of flat Japanese-derived patterns that occupy the field below the landscape and the border areas. These provided evidence that the household was what today we might call "on trend."

"Melbourne" offers an interesting solution to the problem of applying flat printed decoration to holloware forms. While lids most typically carry only border elements, the broad convex surface of this lid presents the full landscape/pattern field composition as the plate--only adapted to a rectangular format (the same rectangular format as the platter.) Ornamental elements from the pattern are arranged in horizontal bands to adorn the sides of the dish. In some ways, the typical relationship between scene and border is reversed.