The factories: Bétera and Segorbe

Before Bétera: the Nalda years (1966–1970)

Before founding his own brand, Ramón Inglés spent a few months as a technician at Porcelanas Bidasoa (Irún) and, briefly, at Lladró —where his more classical style did not fit the aesthetic direction the company was pursuing at the time. His true formative period as a porcelain sculptor came at the Víctor de Nalda Porcelain and Refractories Factory, in Almàssera (Valencia), where he worked as chief sculptor between 1966 and 1970.

When he left Nalda to go independent, the factory gave him a number of old moulds from other sculptors who had worked there —including Vicente Beltrán, Doménech and Fulgencio García— a gesture reflecting the good terms on which he departed.

Bétera (1970)

Ramón Inglés founded his own brand, Porcelanas Inglés, in Bétera in 1970, with its own shop under the name "Inglés, Arte en Porcelana". It was the original workshop, where both the porcelain figures and the start of the doll line were produced.

Segorbe (early 1980s)

The growth of the doll business made it necessary to expand production in the early 1980s. The new site was set up in an old mill built in the 17th century by the Carthusian friars of Valldecrist, out in the countryside, on the administrative boundary between Segorbe and Altura (Castellón) —belonging to Segorbe. At this new factory, the dolls' faces became more elaborate: independent eyes and even a tilting mechanism.

The closure

Ramón's health problems, management difficulties, and the general crisis of the Valencian ceramics sector in the 1990s —which only Lladró survived, until 2000— led to the factory's closure. After Ramón's death in 1997, his sister Fina tried to carry on the business alone in Segorbe, without success. The building and its contents were sold off hastily shortly after, without the factory's archive being preserved.

The Segorbe building has stood abandoned for years; the town council officially declared it "in ruins" in 2016.

Sources

• Antonio Ten Ros, El escultor Ramón Inglés Capella y su obra en porcelana, Universitat de València, 2024. DOI: 10.13140/RG.2.2.33809.65129.
• Jorge Alonso Berzosa, Biography of Ramón Inglés Capella (1932–1997), Centre d'Estudis Locals de Bétera.