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FOR years, ever since the reunification of Germany in fact, I’d planned to visit Dresden.
Somehow I never quite got there. It took the disastrous floods of August of 2002 to remind me that this battered east European city was once called “Florence on the Elbe”.
It rose from the ashes of World War II. And now it has risen from the floodwaters.
I arrived in Dresden not long after the river ebbed and found a beautiful and circumstantial city returning quickly to its normal cultural life.

The Dresden Boys Choir, the State Operetta, the Dresden Philharmonic, and dozens of small theatrical venues were going ahead with their schedules as planned, though performances at the famous Semper Opera house were still cancelled.
Despite the flood – which had ruined sets and scenery – there were tours of the Opera building. I followed along to admire the flamboyance of its 1878 architecture. Destroyed in the fire bombing of 1945, which burned out the historic centre of Dresden, the Semper was painstakingly restored in the 1950s, down to the acres of false marbling on its walls and pillars.

The nearby buildings, too, had been rebuilt to their original plans so that the city’s noble skyline still resembles the painting by Canaletto. The Old Masters Picture Gallery of the Baroque Swinger palace, whose chief treasure is Raphael’s Sistine Madonna, was closed awaiting repair to the water-logged security system.

But the Swinger’s Porcelain Collection was newly open, fresh and elegant from a two-year renovation. This treasury of Japanese, Chinese and Meissen porcelain was founded 300 years ago by Augustus the Strong, Prince Elector of Saxony, King of Poland and Lithuania, whose royal residence Dresden was until his death in 1733.
Although the present collection comprises less than half of the porcelain amassed by Augustus, it is, with 20,000 pieces, the most comprehensive in the world.
Exquisitely arranged in the chandelier-hung galleries of the “Tuileries of Dresden”, the collection gives some idea of the king’s passion for porcelain – he called it his “porcelain disease”.

The oriental ceramics which first whetted the King’s appetite make up one half of the exhibition. Among them stands a cluster of the so-called “Dragoon vases”. These massive blue and white Chinese urns were included in an inventory of 151 pieces for which Augustus traded a regiment of 600 cavalry to the “soldier king” of Prussia.
Almost inevitably, these same soldiers would inflict grievous casualties on the Saxon army during the Silesian Wars.
The balance of the exhibition consists of 18th century Meissen, the work of the King’s own factory, much of it produced to his command. Many of the figurines are familiar, the originals of still-popular Meissen pieces like the Monkey Orchestra and the Commedia dell’ Arte harlequins.

Among the most beautiful objects, though, are the glorious remnants of the 2,200-piece Swan dinner service originally produced between 1737 and 1742 for Count von Bruehl, who was at that time Director of the Meissen factory.
The tureens, plates, bowls, cups and saucers, are as delicate as stiffened lace, all but overwhelmed with aquatic flora and fauna. For the last few years, thanks to Meissen’s policy of archiving its plaster moulds, a faithful replica of this design has been produced in dinner, coffee and tea services.
Meissen is only 15 km to the north-west of Dresden, easy to reach by road, rail, or as I did, by vintage paddle steamer on the Elbe.

Travelling smoothly but slowly downstream while the pistons chugged below, I settled in at a wooden table under a half-roof on the upper deck. The steamer passed little villages and steep slopes planted with vines.
Here and there, flotsam on the roof of a brightly painted house or a tangle of uprooted trees, showed how high the river had flooded. Along the shores, meadows newly fertilised by the flood, were neon-green.
It was a two-hour journey, and I had an engrossing book with me: The Arcanum, by Janet Gleeson, about the discovery of European porcelain. Over a cup of coffee, I skimmed the pages.

The story began at the start of the 18th century, when only the orient held the secret of producing pure white porcelain. At enormous cost, Augustus filled his sumptuous Dresden palaces with thousands of pieces imported from China and Japan.
Providentially, as the King squandered Saxony’s riches on his obsession, word came of an alchemist named Boettger, who claimed to turn lead into gold. His royal command performance in 1701 was the debacle you might expect and Boettger, 19 years old, was promptly imprisoned in a dungeon laboratory.
For nine years, he would remain a lonely captive, staving off execution by striving to transmute lead into gold. However, in 1710, Boettger did hit upon the arcanum, the secret of creating porcelain.

Six months later, Augustus ordered a factory to be set up in the deserted Albrechtsburg Castle in Meissen, where it would be, he hoped, secure from “industrial espionage”.
Boettger, still imprisoned in Dresden, directed production from there. Meissen porcelain, sometimes called “Dresden china”, quickly established itself as a premier luxury item, in demand by all the crowned heads of Europe.

Boettger died penniless, alcoholic and mentally unstable at 37. He was buried in a cemetery where the Dresden town hall now stands.
The factory remained in the Albrechtsburg until it moved to a new production site in the town in 1863. Meissen, unlike Dresden, suffered no damage during World War II and very little from the August floods.

The Old Town was busy with tourists strolling the cobbled streets. Waiters bustled among the tables on sunny terraces. Posters announced the traditional late-September wine festival.
A trail of sightseers made its way up the hilly streets to Meissen’s great gothic cathedral, whose interior was described by Goethe as “the most slender and beautiful of all the buildings of the period I know”.

Albrechtsburg Castle, Meissen’s other great Gothic building, still stands high above the Elbe. The walls of the vaulted rooms where European porcelain was first produced are now covered in murals depicting the history of Meissen.
From the Albrechtsburg, a bus runs to the Meissen factory and exhibition hall. More than 400,000 visitors a year come to tour a series of workrooms where the arts of moulding, embossing and decorating are demonstrated.
It’s impressive to watch a figurine conceived in the 18th or 19th century, come to life again in the hands of a 21st century craftsman.

At the end of the tour there is, of course, a sales room. On my visit, it was doing brisk business. On the next morning, I wandered some of Dresden’s narrow streets, idly looking in shop windows.
Near the river, many of the smaller enterprises were still closed. But further inland, higher than the water had risen, antique, leather, glass, and porcelain shops were already open.

The most attractive merchandise in Dresden, it seemed to me, was Meissen, and the most alluring shop was the official Meissen boutique in the Hilton Hotel. I would have liked an oval tureen in the Onion pattern, priced at €1,096, or even a single Ming Dragon cup and saucer at €326.

But I’m happy with the small, white Meissen medallion I bought. On its face, a bas-relief shows the Elbe in full spate with the German word for ‘help’ floating by like wreckage.
On the reverse the German reads: “High water catastrophe 2002”. It cost €12 and the proceeds went to flood relief.

The Swinger Porcelain Collection is open daily, except Monday, from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Tours of the collection are at Tuesday at 4 p.m. For updated tourist information on Dresden, visit the website www.dresden-tourist.de.

The Meissen Porcelain factory is open daily from 9 a.m. The last guided tour of the workshops is at 4.15 p.m. from November to April and at 5.15 p.m. from May to October. The factory is closed on December 24, 25, 26 and 31.

On the Friday after Whitsun, the hall closes at noon. The website is at www.meissen.de.

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