Company History

H&E Smith was founded by William Henry Smith in 1948. The company set out making refractory glazed tiles. These ceramics were then used to make glazed tile fireplaces.

The early years saw considerable growth in fireplace production resulting in the famous Van Delft range. Eventually the company started to sell its tiles to other fireplace manufacturers, rapidly expanding it's faience lines and feature glazes.

In 1960 William's son Frederick succeeded his father and the business became more involved with wall tile production. In recent years H&E Smith has manufactured many wall tile ranges, the glazed embossed fruit tiles being examples.

Traditional techniques, coupled with an inherently skilled work force, allow the company tremendous flexibility in producing bespoke ranges of varying size, shape and glaze finish. The business is very comfortable in making tiles for restoration projects, and is also happy to consider exclusive commissions to customers requesting such.

Indeed with the introduction of computer aided technology, tiles can now be manufactured from the original designs quickly and cost effectively, offering considerable opportunities for architects and interior designers alike, looking for something that little bit different.

2003 saw the start of a vast re-furbishment programme by the London Underground and since the company had already supplied heritage style tiles in the previous decade for several stations, we were again requested to develop special colour glazes and tiles to match the existing designs of 100 years ago.

2004-2005 saw a positive response to our products and we have supplied several stations with tiles to match the original heritage specifications. Many of these are overseen by ‘English Heritage’ which is an organisation concerned for the preservation and conservation of the original aspects of these prestigious projects.

2005-2006 At the start of 2005 we were very fortunate to have the opportunity to expand our export trade to Russia and have a truly unique representation in Moscow & St. Petersburg who also thinks the ‘Made in England’ caption is synonymous with tradition, style and quality. We see this market as having an ever increasing demand for our quality, traditional style ceramic wall tiles; and as such; we shall be investing resources into the development of this area.

In these latter years we have also decided to complement our range of ceramic wall tiles with some carefully selected porcelain floor tiles. We now offer our clients the Westminster range of top quality Victorian style porcelain geometric floor patterns and designs together with a quality range of polished porcelain large format tiles.