Tea Pots- History and Information

Looking at information about the tea pots in the castle museum it states that there is over 3,000 tea pots in their collection and date from 1730s to 1980s. The section in the castle museum gallery of the tea pots is called 'Twining Teapot' gallery and states about the different shaped and sized tea pots, 'a first world war tank, a cabbage, a castle, bamboo and monkey', and moreover, they also state that there's miniature tea pots and giant ones, a huge variety of tea pots within this collection.

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Images I have taken from the castle museum collection above. Proving the point that there are many different shaped, coloured and sized tea pots, some with detailed patterns and designs and some purely made out of specific materials. It's interesting to see how there's so many tea pots and each are different, some have two handles, some have shorter spouts, some with two spouts, some with loads of design on them and some without. This is the main aspect which drew me to looking specifically at tea pots due to the different sizes and shapes of them and experimenting with this.

Where did tea and tea pots come from?

The earliest suggestion and idea of tea was introduced in china in 780, in the 17th century tea then became more well-known and was being imported from china to Europe. The Chinese tea pot was told to be 'indistinguishable' from the 'wine-ewer', 'a true distinction between wine-ewers and tea pots was only established after 1694, when the British East India company directed that tea pots must have "a grate before the spout"' this meant that they want a barrier from where the tea would pour straight into their drink, something to hold back the tea leaves from entering their drink. This aspect of tea and tea pots is interesting as no one ever really thinks of how tea and the process of drinking this drink started out, to where it is now.

The first mention of tea being sold in Britain and parts of Europe was in 1658, two years down the line when Charles ll married 'Catherine of Braganza' who was familiar with drinking tea in Portugal where she was from; her drinking this drink led to more people liking tea and was soon a changed perception. The first British ceramic tea pots didn't appear until the 1690s and due to china being the inventors and founders of this drink, they were producing many imports and different, successful tea holders and tea pots.

Overall tea and tea pots have progressed throughout the years, coming to being used without 'strainers' and then the development of designs for tea pots, chaning the shapes, sizes, designs etc.