Mildred Mottahedeh

Mildred Ruth Mottahedeh (née Wurtzel; August 7, 1908 – February 17, 2000) was an American collector of ceramics, businessperson, and philanthropist. With her husband, Rafi Y. Mottahedeh, she co-founded Mottahedeh & Company, a designer and supplier of luxury porcelain based on historical models or direct replicas. The couple also gathered a large personal collection of antiques, mainly Chinese export porcelain.

Mottahedeh was born in New Jersey and moved to New York City while still a child. There she met and married Rafi Mottahedeh, and the couple began importing antique porcelain to sell in America. Around World War II, they shifted their focus to producing reproductions of and original pieces based on antiques. The company grew to supply reproductions to museums and other prominent institutions. Many of the pieces were designed by Mildred, who handled much of the company's designs and production. She traveled widely for the company and rose to the position of president after her husband's death.

Mottahedeh's private porcelain collection was considered one of the finest in the world. She also engaged in philanthropic efforts, traveling around the world to advise local artisans. She served as a representative for the Baháʼí Faith, notably to the United Nations.

Early life Mildred Ruth Wurtzel was born on August 7, 1908, in Sea Bright, New Jersey, to Flora Margolius and Jacob B. Wurtzel. Her father was the owner of a grocery in Seabright and her mother was the daughter of Joseph Margolius, who owned the Hotel Brighton in Long Branch, New Jersey. They married in 1903 in an Orthodox Jewish wedding. By 1911 the couple was in the process of getting a divorce, and Mildred was living with her three siblings and her mother.

She was educated at the Garfield Avenue School in Long Branch and attended the New Jersey College for Women. By the time she was thirteen she had moved to New York City and begun to collect Japanese prints after winning one in a contest. At around the age of 19, she converted to Protestantism from Judaism, before becoming a Bahá'i to marry Rafi Y. Mottahedeh, an anthropologist, in 1929. They had two children, including Roy P. Mottahedeh,

Career A plate from the Mottahedeh collection, gifted to the Metropolitan Museum of ArtMottahedeh found work as an interior designer in Manhattan. In 1929 They initially focused on importing antique porcelain, much of it valuable artifacts of the Ming era, as her husband's family shipped crates of china from Tehran. Efn The plates were sold for $87.50, but were worth several thousand dollars by 1989.

As a pioneer in the field at a time when many museums frowned upon reproductions, Mottahedeh advocated heavily in favor of them, saying "If we didn't reprint books, look at how much we'd lose in history ... The same is true of porcelain. If we didn't remake them, we'd lose all those designs." She also described the reproductions as "democratizing" porcelain. Mildred designed some of the original pieces the company made based upon her research and inspired by antiques.

The couple soon began collecting and selling Chinese export porcelain that had been made between 1600 and the 1870s and eventually added reproductions of that style to their line. In her early career she continued to travel to Europe often to visit their factories (four times a year in 1961), and had made the trip sixty times by April 1961. When Queen Elizabeth II visited the US in 1972, the company designed a plate for the occasion. Mottahedeh visited Jingdezhen, China, in 1979 with Charles Donahue, their first time traveling to the country.

In September 1992 Mottahedeh sold her company to Grant and Wendy Kvalheim. They retained Mottahedeh as president, and five months later she told HFD that "I'm still doing the designing and I'm still doing all the public talks and public relations". The Kvalheims worked with Mottahedeh to expand recognition of the company's name, in large part by increasing the advertising budget by 800 percent to run large ads in magazines aimed at consumers.

Consultancy As an authority on the production of china and importation of goods, Mottahedeh traveled around the world to consult on the development of other "small industries and handi-crafts," visiting France and Greece in 1961 and also advising in countries such as China, Morocco, Greece, Sardinia, Italy, and India. Her efforts in China were included in a 1984 television series, The Heart of the Dragon. Nelson Rockefeller wrote in the catalogue's introduction that the collection was "utterly fabulous, an artistic and cultural treasure without comparison in its field". Mottahedeh was known to lend portions of her collection to museums. with the majority of the proceeds to go towards philanthropic endeavors. and resulted in 97 percent of them being sold for around $1.05 million. The auction was credited with "revitalizing" the market for export porcelain. Mottahedeh was present at the signing of the Charter of the United Nations and served as the first representative for the Baháʼí community to the United Nations from 1948 to 1967. As a representative, she advocated and worked for the establishment of a World Parliament. In 1961 she went on a speaking tour around the United States to promote the Baháʼí Faith and advocate for religious tolerance. including several schools in Uganda. She and her husband oversaw the development of four villages in Maharashtra, India The programs run in Samoa taught wood and pearl carving.

Mottahedeh died on February 17, 2000, at Manhattan's NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital. Carl C. Dauterman, a former curator of the Metropolitan Museum's European Decorative Arts program, said that "Mrs. Mottahedeh is one of those rare persons whose careers run in the same channel as their avocations. Her business is running the world's most successful organization for the replication of antique porcelain, and as a hobby [she] has assembled the finest private collection of China-trade porcelains. For energy, business acumen, and a discerning eye, she has no peer in the porcelain world."