If you’re always on the go, a tea tin is good for packing earbuds, hand sanitizer, gum or whatever else that might get easily lost in a roomy crossbody messenger bag or other shoulder bag. An old wooden tea caddy can help keep your paper clips or pushpins organized on your desk too. A metal tea caddy, lined with a plastic bag, can be used to cultivate an herb garden on your kitchen windowsill. They’re a welcome decorative flourish on the mantel in your living room, for example. Today, there are all kinds of ways to use a vintage tea caddy if you’re passing on tea. Wooden tea caddies materialized over time and were seen as sturdier than their ceramic counterparts. At the Taft Museum of Art, there are striking enameled 18th-century-era tea caddies of copper that were given to the institution in 2014. Surviving hand-painted examples from China or elsewhere in Asia made of porcelain might feature enameled landscapes or other designs. Today, antique and vintage tea caddies are collector’s items all over the world. When tea cultivation was relegated to British colonies such as India, and the British East India Company could no longer hold onto its trade monopoly with China, tea was no longer a ritual confined to the wealthy. During Queen Victoria’s reign, small baked treats might be served with your beverage, and teakettles and coffeepots were part of tea services that could include teacups, saucers, a milk pot and other accessories. The idea of “teatime” wasn’t a social event in upper-class British homes until the 1830s or 1840s. The Chinese had been praising the healthy properties of tea, and wealthy Europeans were eager to discover its benefits for themselves during their ritual afternoon tea. Tea Storage Box Organizer - Premium Acacia wood. Tea was thought to be not just a delicious drink but also to have medicinal benefits. Its incredible to imagine that the tea chest has a history back to the Boston Tea Party and beyond. In luxury homes, tea leaves were stowed away in a decorative jar or canister called a tea caddy that was fitted with a lock, or, alternatively, the container was kept in a secured chest or storage cabinet. (This, of course, inevitably yielded a black market for tea leaves.) Tea drinkers hoarded their precious goods, which began to arrive in London ports from China during the 17th century, under lock and key.

When tea first gained popularity during the 1800s, and teatime became commonplace in homes all over England, it was an expensive commodity owing to excessive taxation.

There are lots of uses for your vintage, new or antique tea caddies, but they can certainly serve their original intended purpose if needed.

Vintage tea box organizer