VEB Haldensleben

VEB HALDENSLEBEN (1845-today)

VEB Haldensleben was a state-owned, East German ceramics factory in northern Geman town of Haldensleben. It was organized in 1945 with the nationalization of the Carstens Uffrecht plant that followed the division of Germany at the end of WWII. Carstens lost practically all of its holdings with the establishment of the DDR; the family fled west where brothers Christian and Ernst founded Carstens Tönnieshof on a farm of that name near the village of Freden, not far from the East German border. (VEB is an abbreviation of the phrase Volkseigener Betrieb, or People's Factory.)

Halsdenleben focused primarily on the manufacture of vases. Its output tended to be of superior quality. Many of the motifs show similarities to those of the company VEB Strehla Keramik. Metallic glazes are often included; the colors are generally more subdued than those of contemporaneous West German products.  When Germany was reunited in 1990, the factory was returned to Carstens family hands and renamed Carstens Keramik Rheinsberg.

Halsdenleben used both white and brown clays, depending on availability. Often, though not always, the bottoms of vases were marked with the company's logo—a shallow dish superimposed over the letter 'H' inside a circle. Not unusually for an East German concern, little is recorded about the designers that were employed.

courtesy of Modern Redux