Sugar Bowl from a Tea Service 1807 - 1813

This is a sugar bowl, part of a tea service, made from porcelain by the Worcester Porcelain Works. Although we don't know the precise date of its manufacture, the Worcester Porcelain Works, later known as the Royal Worcester Porcelain Company, was founded in 1751. This puts the bowl into the context of an 18th-century vogue for tea drinking, which was closely associated with the growth of the British Empire. The gold decoration alludes to the exotic locales where tea and sugar were grown, often by enslaved people. This bowl is of interest to the social historian because it demonstrates the way global trade had become entangled with the domestic rituals of the British middle classes. It is through close attention to the historical contexts of production and consumption that we can better understand the social significance of objects like this one. Consulting trade records, company archives, and even cookbooks of the period can shed light on the bowl's place in the world.