The factory mark here (albeit slightly indistinct) is that of a shallow dish superimposed over the letter 'H' inside a circle and is that of the East German pottery VEB Haldensleben. VEB stands for 'Volkseigener Betrieb', meaning a people-owned enterprise and used in relationship to the state owned workplaces in the GDR. Haldensleben is a town in Saxony-Anhalt, Germany and a ceramics factory was created there in 1945 with the nationalization of the Carstens Uffrecht plant that followed the division of Germany at the end of WWII. Halsdenleben focused primarily on the manufacture of vases. Its output tended to be of superior quality and often employed more restrained glazes than those used by its West German counterparts, although some pieces were produced, of which this vase, most likely dating to the 1960s or 1970s, is an example, which followed closely the ‘lava glaze’ effects used by Scheurich and Dümler & Breiden. Upon the reunifucation of Germany in 1990, the factory was returned to its original owners, the Carstens family.