Events

Upcoming IMoDD Events

What’s Happening at IMoDD:

Picnic

The International Museum of Dinnerware Design’s Sixth Biennial Juried Exhibition
Exhibition dates: September 6, 2025 – January 17, 2026

An exhibition for artists and designers in all media exploring the theme Picnic through the creation of specialized dinnerware and related 2D and 3D work.

Click here for more about Picnic


Dining Grails

This ongoing exhibition includes fabulously designed objects by leading designers for industry as well as masterpieces by contemporary artists in the tabletop genre such as Eva Zeisel, Russel Wright, Roy Lichtenstein, Eddie Dominguez and Pop-up book illustrator Robert Sabuda.

Click here for more about Dining Grails


New IMoDD Videos


Fiesta dinnerware from the collection of The Fiesta Tableware Company

Presented by Mark Gonzalez
part of the IMoDD Unforgettable Dinnerware Zoom lecture series
Wednesday, December 10, 2025 at 6:30 PM Eastern time

Click for more information and link to video.


Creating Shapes: 40 Years of Design, Modelmaking, and Moldmaking for Dinnerware and More

Presented by Daniel Mehlman
part of the IMoDD Unforgettable Dinnerware Zoom lecture series
Wednesday, November 12, 2025, 6:30 pm Eastern time

Click here for more about Creating Shapes: 40 Years of Design, Modelmaking, and Moldmaking for Dinnerware and More with link to the video.


Dorothy Wilson Perkins Lecture at Alfred University presented by IMoDD Director Margaret Carney: Binns @ Alfred: n degrees of separation

September 16, 2025 4:30 p.m., Nevins Theater, Powell Campus Center Alfred University Campus, Alfred, New York.

More about Binns @ Alfred: n degrees of separation with link to video


Current Exhibitions:

Dining Grails

This exhibition includes fabulously designed objects by leading designers for industry as well as masterpieces by contemporary artists in the tabletop genre such as Eva Zeisel, Russel Wright, Roy Lichtenstein, Eddie Dominguez and Pop-up book illustrator Robert Sabuda.

Link to: Dining Grails exhibition page

Dining Grails is an ongoing exhibition featuring work from the permanent collection.

Picnic

The International Museum of Dinnerware Design’s Sixth Biennial Juried Exhibition

Exhibition dates: September 6, 2025 – January 17, 2026 Opening reception: Saturday, September 6, 2025, 1 – 4 p.m. Location: The International Museum of Dinnerware Design, 524 Broadway, Kingston, NY 12401

Our special exhibition “PICNIC” features the work of thirty artists in ceramic, glass, metal, plastic, paper, mixed media, watercolor, analog collage, digital photography and digital illustration. The intention of this juried and invitational exhibition is to showcase the best in contemporary design as it relates to the theme Picnic through the creation of specialized dinnerware or 2D and 3D work relating to the topic, as created by artists and designers in all media from the United States. These new creations alongside cherished historic and vintage picnic ware of bygone eras, should satiate one’s appetite for picnic fare.

Link to Picnic on-line Catalogue


Dorothy Wilson Perkins Lecture at Alfred University presented by IMoDD Director Margaret Carney

September 16, 2025 4:30 p.m., Nevins Theater, Powell Campus Center Alfred University Campus, Alfred, New York

Margaret Carney presented a lecture on the legacy of Charles Fergus Binns titled “Binns@Alfred: n degrees of separation.” The lecture is given in support of the exhibition “History: A Legacy in Motion – Alfred Ceramic Art 1900 – 2025” at the Alfred Ceramic Art Museum. The exhibition presents the extraordinarily diverse practices of artists who held (or continue to hold) full time teaching positions at the New York State College of Ceramics School of Art and Design since its creation by Binns in 1900. 

The Alfred Ceramic Art Museum established the Dorothy Wilson Perkins Ceramic History Lecture Series in 1998, thanks to a generous endowment to the Museum by Dr. Lyle Perkins in memory of his wife, Dr. Dorothy Wilson Perkins. Since then the series has brought in exceptional speakers discussing a wide range of topics relating to ceramic history, culture and contemporary practice.

https://ceramicsmuseum.alfred.edu/perkins-lecture-series/carney/index.html


Unforgettable Dinnerware Zoom Lecture Series

The International Museum of Dinnerware Design’s Unforgettable Dinnerware on-line lecture series includes tours of private collections and artist studios, allows one to meet directly with dinnerware designers and contemporary artists, and shares presentations by researchers and authors on major dinnerware manufacturers, including Mid-Century Modern dinnerware. These conversations are presented via Zoom. Our Fall 2025 IMoDD Zoom series began in September 2025 and continues on the second Wednesday of each month through December.

Did you miss any of our Unforgettable Dinnerware lectures? They are available to view on line!  Videos of all of our Unforgettable Dinnerware lectures are available as YouTubes through our IMoDD-Videos Page.

New IMoDD Video:


Wednesday, December 10, 2025 at 6:30 PM Eastern time

Fiesta dinnerware from the collection of The Fiesta Tableware Company

part of the IMoDD Unforgettable Dinnerware Zoom lecture series
Presented by Mark Gonzalez

Link to Video

This presentation will focus on the development of Fiesta with respect to shapes and colors.  All of the pieces featured are from the factory’s collection.  Some unusual and experimental pieces will be shown.

Mark Gonzalez has been collecting and researching dinnerware made in the upper Ohio River Valley for over forty years.  He has authored four books and maintains the LaurelHollowPark.net website. 

New IMoDD Video:


Wednesday, November 12, 2025, 6:30 pm Eastern time

Creating Shapes: 40 Years of Design, Modelmaking, and Moldmaking for Dinnerware and More

part of the IMoDD Unforgettable Dinnerware Zoom lecture series
Presented by Daniel Mehlman

Link to Video

Daniel Mehlman is a freelance designer/craftsman who develops products for the ceramics and glass industry.  Plaster is the traditional material for modelmaking and moldmaking in ceramics, and Dan has a lifetime of experience with this versatile medium.  His clients have included Dansk, Steuben, Corning, Mottahedeh, Lenox, Wilton Armetale, Nambe, Pewabic, Rookwood, Haeger, and many others, as well as numerous studio ceramists. As a modelmaker, he has worked with many noted designers, including Eva Zeisel, and has also made many models for historic reproduction products. He has presented lectures and workshops in ceramics departments around the country. 

In this talk, Dan will show images selected from his diverse body of commercial work in design, models, and molds of dinnerware, vessels, and sculpture. He’ll discuss how product design and production tooling are facilitated by the craft of plaster work.

Dan grew up in New York and has been involved in art and ceramics since an early age. He attended the High School of Music and Art, Rhode Island School of Design (BFA, Ceramics) and California State University, Fullerton (MA, Ceramics). He also has a background in construction, working in his father’s general contracting company in NYC. After graduate school, he taught in the Parsons/New School ceramics program and worked for a master moldmaker, before setting up his own practice. In the ensuing 40+ years , he has played a key role in the design and tooling of hundreds of products.  He lives in an 1889 farmhouse near Albany, NY, where he has built a well-equipped 1,500 sq ft. studio, unique in its dedication to work in plaster, clay, and related materials.  


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Recent Events:

Mixology Event and Pop-Up Exhibition: 

Barware

Mixology Event and Pop-Up Exhibition at the International Museum of Dinnerware Design, 524 Broadway in Kingston

Exhibition Open: May 22 – June 1, 2025
Opening Event: Thursday, May 22 from 5:00 to 8:00 pm

IMoDD’s Barware exhibition includes international barware in the Art Deco and Mid-Century Modern eras (late 1920s-1960s+) from the Netherlands, Germany, Japan, Portugal, and France and American made glass, chrome, wood, rattan, and plastic cocktail implements and related barware.

[LINK] for more information


The International Museum of Dinnerware Design
Members Preview Party

524 Broadway, Kingston, NY
Saturday, October 26, 2024, 4:30 to 7:30 pm.

IMoDD invited museum members and honored guests to a celebration to preview our inaugural exhibitions in advance of the formal opening of the museum on November 2.