Where to buy vintage porcalin teacups

[MmBuddha]

Hello Teachat,

My recent online browsing has led me to at least a small handful of websites selling nice, affordable teaware to use with my new Yixing. There's a lot out there but too much of it sold through western tea vendors feels like your average Chinatown fare. In any case, despite finding nice options I really love old porcalin, especially simple, handmade, dragon kiln-fired teacups, or any like them with variation between each piece before more uniform production methods came along.

I'm especially on the lookout for both small (25ml-ish) and medium-sized (40-60ml) antique porcalin cups, the kind which would have been humble, everyday objects in their day, but I've found few reliable sources online.

I hoped I might turn to the collective wisdom of teachat to ask if you have any pointers.

Thanks for your help.

[jayinhk]

Hello Teachat,

My recent online browsing has led me to at least a small handful of websites selling nice, affordable teaware to use with my new Yixing. There's a lot out there but too much of it sold through western tea vendors feels like your average Chinatown fare. In any case, despite finding nice options I really love old porcalin, especially simple, handmade, dragon kiln-fired teacups, or any like them with variation between each piece before more uniform production methods came along.

I'm especially on the lookout for both small (25ml-ish) and medium-sized (40-60ml) antique porcalin cups, the kind which would have been humble, everyday objects in their day, but I've found few reliable sources online.

I hoped I might turn to the collective wisdom of teachat to ask if you have any pointers.

Thanks for your help.

I've got some small, handpainted 1970s Chaozhou gongfucha cups on the site. The porcelain used back then was much whiter than today's standard porcelain.

http://www.tealifehk.com/products/1970s ... elain-cups

[bleadof]

EoT carries some https://www.essenceoftea.com/teaware/po ... elain.html

Sent from my Nexus 6P using Tapatalk

[kuánglóng]

I bought some really nice porcelain cups from Honza a while ago. Once in a while he has some older cups in stock.
http://www.chawangshop.com/index.php/te ... -cups.html

[Bok]

Loads on ebay, mostly export porcelain. So China made but style-wise a bit different. More chances not to get ripped off. I have seen so many fake old cups here in Asia... So here you need to touch them and have closer look, not advisable to buy online.

Exceptions are those mentioned above.

[ethan]

MmBuddha, I have seen Jay buying porcelain. He is thorough. I expect you would get what you expect from him, no fakes. Cheers

[theredbaron]

Chawangshop and Essenceoftea regularly have old cups, but also on ebay are many, also from Japan based shops such as http://stores.ebay.com/Japanese-Antique ... AGI?_rdc=1 and http://stores.ebay.com/tomoidak?_rdc=1 . On ebay some are copies, but many are real. Prices get higher, but are generally still somewhat affordable.
While nowadays cups from the 70's seem to get popular, i would still try to go for late Qing or ROC, if possible. Ming are way too expensive, and many fakes around.

[kyarazen]

70-80s is a nice functional use range. there are some 80s 25ml chaozhou cups that go off the shelf for a dollar a pop here.

if into the qing/ming era, they are nice but hard to get perfect/good condition ones. they are either from the ground or from the seabed. late qing to ROC... i get mine from honza @ chawangshop

[theredbaron]

70-80s is a nice functional use range. there are some 80s 25ml chaozhou cups that go off the shelf for a dollar a pop here.

That's what i paid 20 years or so ago for late qing export cups in Penang, stacks of them in the shops...

[Hmm]

Any tasting notes on how porcelain thickness/age affects taste? I seem to recall there were a few posts on that, but couldn't find them. Never bother to see if there was a difference until now.

I just tried quickly between the normal modern tea cup I use (http://www.ebay.com/itm/handmade-6pcs-C ... SwwIZXTT7Y), which is quite wide in comparison to a vintage one, that's thicker and taller. I was drinking some bi luo chun, and found that the modern cup had a lot more taste, and thicker tannin feel to it, while the vintage one tasted much more subdued. Although the vintage one had more aroma. I suppose whatever tea stains are on the cup could greatly affect the taste too.

-----

Also not sure if it's the same elsewhere, but my understanding in the US is that antique means anything older 100 years, while vintage is anything less than that... So a 70s cup is vintage but not antique.

[Bok]

Any tasting notes on how porcelain thickness/age affects taste? I seem to recall there were a few posts on that, but couldn't find them. Never bother to see if there was a difference until now.

I just tried quickly between the normal modern tea cup I use (http://www.ebay.com/itm/handmade-6pcs-C ... SwwIZXTT7Y), which is quite wide in comparison to a vintage one, that's thicker and taller. I was drinking some bi luo chun, and found that the modern cup had a lot more taste, and thicker tannin feel to it, while the vintage one tasted much more subdued. Although the vintage one had more aroma. I suppose whatever tea stains are on the cup could greatly affect the taste too.

-----

Also not sure if it's the same elsewhere, but my understanding in the US is that antique means anything older 100 years, while vintage is anything less than that... So a 70s cup is vintage but not antique.

What those threads seemed to concur in the end was that it comes down to shape and thickness more than how old the procelain is.

I personally like my antique cups, I like drinking from a piece of history and the imperfect condition they are in. The perfect ones I cant’t afford anyways, haha