Question:
I have a King of Tarts bank. It appears to have been made at the factory out of a King of Tarts cookie jar, except the coin slot and the hole in the bottom are both done prior to glazing. It is clearly stamped RED WING on the bottom. If you look in the hole you can see where the lid was attached. Can you give me any ideas about this item and its value? It has no chips or cracks.

Answer:
This King of Tarts item was listed recently on eBay. At the time I did not believe it was an authentic Red Wing product and that continues to be my opinion.

When the Red Wing Potteries closed in 1967 the company’s assets were sold, including the molds used to form dinnerware and art pottery items. Many of these molds were obtained by art schools and hobby potters. Because the company was no longer in business there was no attempt to rub out the Red Wing name from the molds. Thus the presence of the Red Wing name on the bottom of an item is no guarantee it was made by Red Wing Potteries. This bank was almost certainly made by an amateur potter using an old King of Tarts mold. While attractive, the colors and decorating scheme do not resemble the artwork used on most Red Wing dinnerware or art pottery.  Most Red Wing items featured a base glaze over the entire piece with hand painted artwork applied by several painters in production line fashion.  This bank does not have a single base color with hand painted features; instead the bank is decorated in a variety of solid colors.

A few collectors are mildly interested in post-production items made from Red Wing molds as curiosities but generally they are not worth much.  This King of Tarts bank is more interesting than most such items and thus it might have moderate value.  It’s hard to assign a value because there is no established market for such things, but I’d guess this bank is worth in the range of $20 to $40.

Larry