After 15+ Years It's Time...

...to retire my old set of dishes. They were made by Mikasa Studio One, which was the 'casual dining' part of Mikasa. Which translates to 'stoneware', and damned good stuff.

I have the 'Village Trail' pattern, which is a faintly speckled glaze with a rim design of grape leaves and berries, very attractive and old Tuscany-looking.

But after all these years a lot of the pieces have broken or become chipped, and they are ALL noticeably harder to clean these days as the glaze wears thin. It's been a great set, and I remember going to the Mikasa outlet store in Fullerton to pick it out. Sad to say, Mikasa stores do not exist anymore. So I went looking online at Mikasa, confident that I'd find something I like as a replacement.

The short answer? No.

And I'm not especially super picky about dishes, either! Noritake has this set, that is microwave safe:

This one from Phaltzgraff is nice, too:

This is made by Sango, Avanti--nice deep colors:

This tortoiseshell set is lovely, too:

Here's one called Galaxy Jade:

Kon-Tiki:

And Pearl Shimmer:

No doubt that finally deciding on a set will be far simpler than carting ourselves all over town to actually see them in person.