Dankotuwa concludes Table Top competition

Dankotuwa Porcelain PLC held its Table Top Show at the Grand Ballroom of the Galadari Hotel on 26 March 2012.  

“We first held this in 1990 to introduce elegant table settings to the general public of Sri Lanka” says Dankotuwa Chairman Sunil Wijesinha, adding further that “the Table Top Show was held regularly in the early years but for the last 6 years it was not held.  We decided to revive it on a grand scale after the infusion of funds by Environmental Resources Investment PLC [ERI].”  

Dankotuwa says that the objective is to promote good table arrangements and good table etiquette in Sri Lanka, and wean people away from less fashionable buffet style dinners when entertaining at home.  

The show consisted of a competition as well.  In the first round, interested competitors applied with photographs of arrangements they had done.  After a short listing, a second round of live arrangements were held where the judges evaluated them on the correct placement of the porcelain ware, cutlery, glassware, centre pieces, napkins etc., good colour balance, matching the design on the porcelain ware with a table cloth, place mats, runners, napkins and other decorations, the theme selected and how the arrangement conforms to the theme.

The nine finalists were given dinner sets from Dankotuwa two weeks in advance, so that they had sufficient time for selecting the appropriate accessories, and were given three hours on the morning of the event to prepare the table after which the judging was carried out by three judges: Dankotuwa Director Scott Newsome, celebrity chef and actor Koluu Ranawake and well known artist Iromie Wijeywardena. While the judges gave the 75% of the total marks, the invitees for the show gave the balance 25%. Accordingly, the declared winners were as follows: Winner Fazeena Ruzain, 1st Runner Up – Subhashini Loganathan and second Runner Up Ursala Peiris.

In addition to the nine competitor tables, Dankotuwa also displayed many of the other designs as well as designs conforming with their latest campaign ‘A day with Dankotuwa.’

w This campaign encourages the use of bright coloured Dankotuwa mugs for their morning tea or coffee, colourful designs for breakfast, simple casual designs for mid-morning tea, subtle designs for lunch and richer designs for dinner, followed by richer designs for after dinner coffee. Dankotuwa also demonstrated its high quality features such as its high whiteness, high translucency, high strength, high scratch resistance, high chip resistance, high thermal shock resistance etc.  The event also included ‘Design your Own Mug’ corner where several people tried their hand and decorating a mug.  Several draws were also held where 16 people received prizes of Dankotuwa products.  The general comment of most invitees was that the all competitor tables were prepared to a very high standard. The invitees were amazed at the beautiful arrangements based on various themes such as an engagement dinner, silver wedding, Halloween, Christmas, etc. There were many requests to visit the factory to see how this world-class porcelain is being made.