With tea consumption in the U.S. having more than doubled since 1990, according to Bon Appetit magazine, holi-day shopping lists this year might do well to include something delectable or decorative for the tea drinker. Contrary to the stereotype of tea drinkers as stogy, pipe-smoking Anglophiles, tea has become a mainstream beverage, considered good for one’s health, conducive to social interaction and complementary to the rising popularity of Yoga and Feng Shui. An artistic twist on the trend comes in the form of whimsical teapots and tea sets, notes Peggy Boskey founder of the website Teapot Treasures .
“Taking tea is one of life’s creature comforts, a time to sit and sip alone or relax and chat with a group of friends,” says Boskey. “And nothing enhances the experience of fine-tasting tea as much as a teapot hand crafted by an artist. In my pursuit to find unique teapots for my own collection, I discovered the creations of some wonderfully talented artisans. It was then that I decided to put together a large selection of contemporary ceramic, cast iron and china teapots to delight the eye along with the palate.”
Besides teapots and tea sets, Teapot Treasures offers additional suggestions for the tea lovers on one’s holiday list:
    — Ceramic tiles designed to protect a wooden table from a hot teapot
 – Body Tea - herbal tea for the bath & eyes
 – Children’s tea sets
 ”Buyers of our one-of-a-kind teapots signed by the artist and recreations of ancient Chinese Yixing teapots don’t necessarily even drink tea,” adds Peggy Boskey. “They appreciate the fine craftsmanship and collect them as affordable works of art.”

From the Air China logo to the icon that twisted the Olympic rings into the image of a man doing taiji, Han Meilin’s visions are everywhere.
Now the famed, versatile and prolific artist who created some of the country’s most recognizable imagery will stage China’s largest-ever one-man art show at the China National Art Museum.
Han, in fact, will take over every exhibition hall to display more than 3,000 new pieces from December 31 through January 13.
His last solo event, a 1999 exhibition, lured more than 50,000 viewers, he predicts this one will be even bigger and more successful.
He didn’t even know if he will be alive to see it. Han, 65, is recovering from a major heart attack and bypass sur-gery earlier this year.
The artist says he still possesses the creative enthusiasm of a young man and his prime has yet to occur.
The works in show were created over the past two years by him and his assistants and students. They span a vast range of formats that include painting, calligraphy, sculpture, pottery, wax printing, grass weaving, bull skin tapestry, red sandalwood carving, bronze weaponry and clothwork tigers.
The display’s highlights include a series of calligraphic work called “Heavenly Characters,” bronzeware sculptures such as “Little Animals,” ink paintings of nudes, Junci porcelain works and Yixing-style purple clay teapots.
Junci is the oldest and one of the most important styles in Chinese porcelain art. Yixing teapot is an art from East China’s Jiangsu Province.
Many of the works weren’t made inside a Beijing studio but out in the countryside.
“I don’t like creating artistic works ‘behind closed doors,’” Han said.
Han led his 20-member group - including seven students - across China on a 30,000-kilometre mini-bus trek through eight provinces. They sought inspiration from local folk arts.
Viewers will be amazed by the range of Han’s versatility. “If an artist wants to keep developing, he should master different artistic genres - not only calligraphy, sculpture or wax printing but also music and literature,” he said.
A 1960 graduate of the Central Academy of Arts and Design, Han certainly takes his own advice.
In 1980, learning that no Chinese was invited to attend the international seminar on China’s porcelain kilns system held in New York, Han made dozens of trips to the five major porcelain kilns in China to acquire porcelain-making skills.
Now colossal sculptures designed by Han can be seen in many Chinese cities.
His granite sculpture of six tigers now stands in Dalian, a port city of Northeast China’s Liaoning Province. It is more than 43 metre long and weighs 4,800 tons.
His “Five-Dragon Clock Tower” ranked No 1 in the International Sculpture Competition organized by the Interna-tional Olympic Committee and the Atlanta Olympic Committee in 1996. It is now a permanent fixture in Atlanta’s Olympic Square.
Han’s creations are well-known even by those who don’t realize whose they are. He designed the much sought-after stamp for the Year of the Monkey in 1983 and the 1985 Panda stamp. The red phoenix logo for Air China and the taiji logo for the Beijing 2008 Olympics bid campaign also comes partly from his fertile mind. (The bid logo was co-created by designer Chen Shaohua.) Han has held several personal art exhibitions since 1979 in cities such as Beijing, Shenzhen, Hong Kong, Taipei, New York, Boston, Toronto, Singapore and Paris. New York City even honoured him by designating one day of his exhibit there, October 10, 1990, as the Han Meilin Day.
“I believe that Chinese artists can create work at the highest level if we can perfectly integrate indigenous art with contemporary concepts,” the artist said.
Han hopes his work appeals to ordinary people, not critics. Critics look at art pieces from the academic viewpoint and don’t take much interest in folk art elements, he griped.
Indeed, Han worries greatly about the future of Chinese folk arts.
“The market for traditional Chinese handicrafts keeps shrinking and many factories are facing bankruptcy,” he said.
Many traditional art works need a lot of handiwork, including lacquerware, wax printing, tie-dye and grass weaving articles.
But high prices for handmade products have scared away ordinary Chinese people. The old-fashioned designs of the traditional handicrafts don’t interest foreigners, either.
This is why Han is expanding beyond making his own art into an effort to rescue Chinese folk arts. He offers free training around the country in the technical aspects of these crafts.
His art studios, too, are efforts to impart wisdom. He opened his first in eastern Beijing in 1989, and now has sev-eral that include sites in Henan and Shanxi provinces and one in Shenzhen.
“My studios are far from enough to save folk art,” said Han, calling on more Chinese artists to join him in the cul-tural mission.
Han has drawn from his own life experience in his artistic career. During the “culture revolution” (1966-76), Han was forced to leave his post as a lecturer at his alma mater and to take up a job at a pottery workshop in East China’s Anhui Province. There, he suffered distress, imprisonment, insult, poverty, illness and separation from his family.
“Life with hardship is not always a bad thing for artists,” Han said, calmly recalling those nightmarish years. “The hard times in my life made my will power strong and served as a major motivation for my ceaseless artistic creation.” During his frequent journeys to rural areas across the country, Han, shocked by the vast rural poverty, began to donate schoolbags and sets of stationary to children there.

ZishaTeapot.co.uk is a leading online retailer of quality Zisha Teapots and tea accessories. We were established in 2006 in the city of Yixing China. The people at ZishaTeapot.co.uk are dedicated to providing our customers with a complete China Teapots experience. Along with our fine selections of Chinese Zisha Teapots, we also offer elegant tea sets and beautiful teacups. Not only will we offer a wonderful selection at a great value, but we also strive to educate on the many health benefits of tea and Chinese tea culture.

Dressed in a bright red Chinese shirt and with her eyes wide open, Tseng Yu-hui sits at a table, concentrating on proportions of tea leaves and their infusion time.
The Taiwanese tea master opened her Maison des Trois Thes (House of the Three Teas) on the Rue Mouffetard, a lively Parisian street in the French capital’s fifth district, two years ago. Today, she is writing a guidebook about tea and has set up her own Web site on the Internet.
Tseng prides herself on having created the first traditional Taiwanese style tea house in Europe that offers quality and range - there are 40 kinds on the menu, and many other kinds for sale.
“There is no school to learn about tea, and the art of tea, which used to be passed on from generation to generation within families, is disappearing,” she said.
Following a long apprenticeship, Tseng has become a genuine tea master. She has been practising the art since her childhood, first with her family in Taiwan’s Nantou region, then with several tea masters. When she was a child, her grandfather used to wake her up in the middle of the night to have her smell the scent of the “Queen of the Night”, a special flower that blossoms at night only once a year.
Yet growing up in the world of tea plants and preparations does not fully account for Tseng’s rare mastery which, as she explained, came about as a result of manifold skills. She explored fields as varied as music, calligraphy, martial arts and traditional medicine. “All of these experiences are part of the understanding of the spirit of tea,” she declared.
Tseng practised acupuncture in a Taiwanese hospital for two years. Later, as a clarinetist, she won top national awards in Taiwan in 1970 and 1971. Her musical skills carried her to Europe and eventually to Paris, where she decided to stay in 1990. Two or three times a year, Tseng returns to Taiwan and China. She likes to stroll in tea gardens and walk the hills of Fujian and Zhejiang, and even ventures into the remote mountainous areas of Tibet.
Within the very private club of tea connoisseurs and growers, Tseng has developed an important network. The “Tea Road”, as she calls it, allows her to pinpoint the right soils and best vintages before going there herself to taste the newly harvested teas. “Tea leaves are handpicked and then undergo several operations, from seasoning and withering to fermentation,” she said. Each step is carefully monitored, with time and heat being important factors. Storage is yet another delicate operation.
Her trips back to Asia are akin to treasure hunts. Selecting high-quality teas and discovering rare and old varieties requires good connections and a great deal of time.
Some top range teas, prized in competitions, can cost up to US$ 20,000 a kilogram. Fortunately, not all high qual-ity teas are sold at such prohibitive prices, yet each time she returns to China her best-informed clients order some of her very best and most expensive teas.
Mastering the preparation of tea also means knowing how to use the right implements. First of all, you need the right teapot. Tseng gets hers from traditional potters in Jiangsu province, where the famous Yixing pots are made.
“One variety of tea, one kind of clay. Colored teapots and rather ferrous clays are good criteria. You have to watch out for fake Yixing artifacts,” said Tseng.
To find the right clays and pots, Tseng goes to small and highly protected quarries. The choice of the right pot also depends on its technical qualities, such as its “air-tight aspect”. And there is a great demand for some pieces: “There are many collectors in Taiwan, Japan and Hong Kong. In Taiwan alone, there are about one million (collectors). This does not mean, however, that they are tea connoisseurs.”
A visit to Tseng’s tea house is a subtle form of entertainment as she readily discusses the spirit of the earth and tea-leaves, the fragrances and blends of teas - much like a wine expert passionately talks about the aroma of a good wine, its vintage and qualities.
Sometimes she organizes meetings with confirmed amateurs.
“You should see them,” said Fabien Maiolino, Tseng’s enthusiastic partner. The meetings start around 8.00pm and last well into the early hours of the morning. People talk endlessly about the color of a tea, its resemblance to a fruit or a flower - “that such a thing can happen with French people is just unbelievable,” Maiolino said. “They can spend a whole evening tasting only three sorts of tea. And when they come here, they know they should not wear any make-up or perfume because it would spoil the scents and flavors of the teas.”
The smell of bamboo coming out of the earth, the perfumes of flowers and coconut and the flavor of honey are among the many references used by initiates. It often takes time to translate and adapt Chinese words describing the consistency of tea, and some amateurs seek advice from the agronomists at the Paris botanical garden.
Tseng has won wide recognition as a tea master and has her own mastership seal. An increasing number of trendy tea houses and shops in Paris call on her for her expertise. Her outstanding sharpness never fails to astonish: She can even tell what type of plant grows in the vicinity of a tea garden.
Tseng recently established a partnership with the famous George V tea club in Paris. There she organizes tea workshops to introduce French amateurs to the basics of the complex art of brewing Chinese tea.
Participants are first taught about the history of tea, its cultural and sociological environment. They learn that the practice of infusion goes back to the Ming dynasty (1368-1644) - in earlier periods, tea was stamped and boiled. They also learn about the main regions for tea plants and the importance of weather and soils, and that in Taiwan there are about seven harvests a year while there are only three in China. They are told how to differentiate green tea from yellow, red and black teas, or how to sort out varieties of green-blue teas.
Getting down to the ritual of the actual preparation, one carefully watches how to first rinse the teapot, inside and out, as well as the leaves to avoid burning them. The teapot is then filled until it overflows so as to get rid of the froth. It is a scrupulous process which offers its greatest reward when one breathes the the scent emerging from the cup. Tseng herself spends hours every day tasting and smelling, breathing and inhaling out of sheer pleasure and to the delight of her customers.
Asked about the right water to use, she sighed, saying that this was in fact the hardest part of the job. After testing many mineral waters, she decided the best thing to do was to filter tap water. “Actually, the best would be to use the famous Galloping Tiger spring water in China, but we can’t afford it,” she said.
Today, tea houses in China are popular places where you can enjoy having a drink and some food, she said. In Sichuan province, there are about 200 of them. In recent years, Taiwanese have opened fashionable tea houses on the mainland.
But most of China’s tea rooms are not places where you can appreciate the quality of tea, according to Tseng. One must keep in mind, she said, the damage done by the Cultural Revolution. Tea at that time was associated with Con fucianism and “the old ideas”. The Red Guards destroyed many 800-year-old trees and entire varieties were lost.
The Chinese “spirit of tea” or gong fu cha is quite different from the complex Japanese tea ceremony, in which etiquette and measured gestures are more important than appreciating the qualities of the tea itself. Sitting on a cushion on the floor in Tseng’s soberly decorated room, one can enjoy infinite varieties of the beverage and dream about their mysterious names: Long jin (dragon’s well), tie guan yin (iron mercy goddess), bai hao (oriental beauty), dong ding (ice peak). Or fall under the poetic spell of green-blue teas, with their rising twirls of delicate full-bloom scents.
Close your eyes and enchanting visions of the foggy landscapes, mountains and rivers of a Song dynasty painting, come to mind.

KUALA LUMPUR, Sept 17 (Bernama) — For the first time, the world will get to see the treasures salvaged from 10 ships, which sank in the 14th to the 16th centuries as well as the 19th century, at the Malaysian Archaeological Ex-hibition at Muzium Negara starting Nov 15.
Museums and Antiquities Department Director-General Datuk Kamarul Baharin Buyong said today the ships in-volved included the Risdam, Nassau, Diana, Flor De La Mar, Nan Hai and Desaru.
The year-long exhibition would give a full chonology of the ceramics recovered from the ships, he told a media conference here.
He said research on the ships which sank in 1370, 1380, 1400, 1460, 1540 and 1550 had shed new light on the ce-ramic trade in Southeast Asia in the pre-colonial era.
He said ships that sank in the 17th to 19th centuries did not carry a lot of procelain but data and artefacts salvaged were important in understanding more about the trade route in the region then.
Kamarul hoped that the exhibition would stoke the interest of both the locals and foreigners in archaeology.
On the discovery of a 19th century ship south of Desaru in May, he said the artecacts in the ship would be recorded this year and next, after which the ship would be raised from its resting place 20m under the sea.
He said the significance of this discovery by Nanhai Marine Archaeology Sdn Bhd would be investigated and mapped together by museum personnel, which would provide a platform for transfer of technology in maritime arc-haeology, a fairly new venture in Malaysia.
He said the department had taken several measures to ensure the safety and authenticity of this shipwreck and the site would be proposed to be declared an archaeological site and any unauthorised diving activities would be prohibited.
Nanhai Marine Archaeology Sdn Bhd managing director Sten Sjostrand said the ceramics on board the ship were mainly Chinese blue and white porcelain, made for the Southest Asian markets.
The ship’s location in the deep muddy bottom had protected and kept the pottery in pristine condition despite its age, he said.
The ceramic samples recovered so far included blue and white porcelain dishes and plates from the Jingdezhen kilns in China, famous for fine quality porcelain.
Other valuable objects salvaged are teapots from the Yixing, which is known for the manufacture of the best quality teapots until today. The stamp in the base of some Yixing teapots indicate a manufacturing period of 1821-1850.
There are also pots made during the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644).
So far about 645 pieces of ceramic have been taken out from the surface of the ship since early June.
“A piece of hull plank taken from the ship, which is about 30m in length and 7m in width, shows that it was made from cedar and pine (that does not grow in Southeast Asia) indicating that the ship was built in China,” Sjostrand said.
He said that as no similar ship from this period had ever been reported, the ship’s remains and construction details were of the greatest importance for charting shipbuilding techniques prevailing in Asia around the 19th century. $137:Newswire

Metaphorically, really. I’m more interested in conveying ideas than I am tea. In 1980, I first came to Montana. I love the expansive landscape. But I don’t know that the landscape really affects the work. I’m working out of a political landscape, really. I’m getting good reduction. I’ve reduced the, uh, oxygen level in the kiln. The flames just come jumping out because they’re literally seeking oxygen. Just putting a little more gas in so it’ll fire a little quicker. I do about a four day firing cycle. Drives my wife crazy. Uh, you know, I get up every two hours to check the kiln. I was born in Chicago shortly after World War II. (projector clicking) I’ve always made things by hand. When I was a kid, I was constantly making models. My father was an immigration lawyer. We had many gifts from Chinese clients in our house. And so, from a very early age, I became very fascinated with the intricate, with detail, with very tight meticulous carving. When I was a kid, I remember seeing the very stark footage of the discovery of the concentration camps. The piles of bodies. Had a very, very strong impact on my life. I’m carving ears. There are two different clays that I layer so that what I get in the end is something that looks very much like sedimentary rock. It’s part of this ongoing project that I call “The Legacy Project.” And it consists of a pile of ears. The pile keeps changing and there’s so many different layers of meaning. You know, the fact that ears have long been used as a way of counting the dead in war. The other thing about the pile of ears is I was very much trying to recapture the sense of the pile of shoes after the Holocaust, the remains of people that are gone. So they are ears that are stone-deaf. They’re not learning the lessons that are all around us. You know, I work from a place that’s deep inside me. That-that I’m very passionately angry about. I’m pissed off that there are nuclear weapons, you know? If an artist can’t say what they really feel in their heart, you know, what the hell is the point? (strained): Okay… Got it. The vessel is really the primary canvas of ceramics. And the teapot is the most complex of vessels. You can really play with a lot of images and juxtapose a lot of different images to build a narrative. Urban destruction from World War II becomes a teapot. This is the handle… uh, the lid right here, this kind of lifts out. And, uh, this rubble creates a vessel which connects with this kind of tilted, broken chimney which becomes a spout. The yixing teapot was literally invented in Yixing, China, about 1,500 A.D.. Suddenly, there is an explosion of creativity. All different forms, from segmented forms to natural forms to geometric forms. I’m inspired by these pots. I’m inspired by the craftsmanship, the finesse of line, the compositions. But while I imitate the pots in a technical, and sometimes esthetic sense, I’m not making Yixing pots.

For the first time, the world will get to see the treasures salvaged from 10 ships, which sank in the 14th to the 16th centuries as well as the 19th century, at the Malaysian Archaeological Exhibition at Muzium Negara starting Nov 15. Museums and Antiquities Department Director-General Datuk Kamarul Baharin Buyong said today the ships in-volved included the Risdam, Nassau, Diana, Flor De La Mar, Nan Hai and Desaru. The year-long exhibition would give a full chonology of the ceramics recovered from the ships, he told a media conference here.  He said research on the ships which sank in 1370, 1380, 1400, 1460, 1540 and 1550 had shed new light on the ce-ramic trade in Southeast Asia in the pre-colonial era. He said ships that sank in the 17th to 19th centuries did not carry a lot of procelain but data and artefacts salvaged were important in understanding more about the trade route in the region then. Kamarul hoped that the exhibition would stoke the interest of both the locals and foreigners in archaeology. On the discovery of a 19th century ship south of Desaru in May, he said the artecacts in the ship would be recorded this year and next, after which the ship would be raised from its resting place 20m under the sea. He said the significance of this discovery by Nanhai Marine Archaeology Sdn Bhd would be investigated and mapped together by museum personnel, which would provide a platform for transfer of technology in maritime arc-haeology, a fairly new venture in Malaysia. He said the department had taken several measures to ensure the safety and authenticity of this shipwreck and the site would be proposed to be declared an archaeological site and any unauthorised diving activities would be prohibited. Nanhai Marine Archaeology Sdn Bhd managing director Sten Sjostrand said the ceramics on board the ship were mainly Chinese blue and white porcelain, made for the Southest Asian markets. The ship’s location in the deep muddy bottom had protected and kept the pottery in pristine condition despite its age, he said. The ceramic samples recovered so far included blue and white porcelain dishes and plates from the Jingdezhen kilns in China, famous for fine quality porcelain. Other valuable objects salvaged are teapots from the Yixing, which is known for the manufacture of the best quality teapots until today. The stamp in the base of some Yixing teapots indicate a manufacturing period of 1821-1850. There are also pots made during the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644). So far about 645 pieces of ceramic have been taken out from the surface of the ship since early June. “A piece of hull plank taken from the ship, which is about 30m in length and 7m in width, shows that it was made from cedar and pine (that does not grow in Southeast Asia) indicating that the ship was built in China,” Sjostrand said. He said that as no similar ship from this period had ever been reported, the ship’s remains and construction details were of the greatest importance for charting shipbuilding techniques prevailing in Asia around the 19th century.

Fambios knows her stuff; much of her information comes from a slew of books on the subject (see sidebar), which can be ordered through your local bookstore or via Web sites. Most stores, from the larger ones like Chapters and Indi-go to the smaller neighbourhood vendors, generally have sections on collectibles.
Second-hand shops, like S.W. Welch on St. Laurent Blvd., also have books on collectibles you can buy for far less money.
For Fambios, the artistic teapots are more valuable than the fun, contemporary ones. “I’ve really started appreciat-ing the art involved in a great deal of them,” she said. “I’ve got some from Russia that were made by artists and are purely decorative. If you spend time examining their detailed work, you really fall in love with them.”
She stressed that people collect for different reasons. “If you’re doing it for fun, you don’t really look at the price tag, because you’re not looking to increase your investment. If, on the other hand, you do collect for the investment value, you tend to buy more conservatively.”
Whatever the reason, yixing teapot collecting can be a fun, and even profitable, hobby for people of all ages and incomes. And let’s not forget that most are functional, too. Tea, anyone?
For Teapot Initiates
Collector’s Club
- Cardew Design North America Inc., P.O. Box 8208, Paducah, KY., United States 42002-8208. Or call their New Jersey office at (877) 922-7339.
Books
- Teapots: The Collector’s Guide, by Tina M. Carter. Book Sales Incorporated, 1998
- Design Icons: The Teapot, by Guy Julier Aurum Press, 1999
- China Teapots, Pottery and Porcelain (Antique Collector’s Pocket Guides) by Pauline Agius. Parkwest Publica-tions, 1997
- The Eccentric Teapot: Four Hundred Years of Invention, by Garth Clark. Abbeville Press Incorporated, 1996
Web Sites
- The Teapottery for British collectibles: www.teapottery. co.uk/index.htm
- Yixing Teapot site for lovely, collectible and functional teapots from China: www.yixing.com
- Hall China Collecting site devoted to the Hall China Company’s famous teapots and other products, sold since 1903: www. inter-services.com/HallChina/
- The Tea Zone, site of the Tea Council of Canada for everything you’ve always wanted to know about tea: www.tea.ca/
- For a lovely line of Russian teapots and other porcelain items (the site partly under construction), try: www.gzhel.com/
Local Stores
A few of the stores in the Montreal area that sell collectible teapots:
- The Linen Chest has a nice selection of limited editions, including the popular Fitz and Floyd line. Stores in Centre Rockland, Promenades de la Cathedrale, Galeries Laval and Place Portobello in Brossard.
- The Shayne Gallery for one-of-a-kind teapots designed by Canadian artists, 5471 Royalmount, T.M.R., (514) 739-1701
- The Montreal Museum of Fine Arts Gift Shop, 1379 Sherbrooke St. W. (514) 285-1600.
- Rob McIntosh outlets also carry such collectible teapots as Fitz and Floyd as well as a Russian line called Lomo-nosov. They have a location at 2335 Trans Canada, Pointe Claire, (514) 697-4885. They have their warehouse outlet in Lancaster, Ont.

ZishaTeapot.co.uk is a leading online retailer of quality Zisha Teapots and tea accessories. We were established in 2006 in the city of Yixing China. The people at ZishaTeapot.co.uk are dedicated to providing our customers with a complete China Teapots experience. Along with our fine selections of Chinese Zisha Teapots, we also offer elegant tea sets and beautiful teacups. Not only will we offer a wonderful selection at a great value, but we also strive to educate on the many health benefits of tea and Chinese tea culture.

“The Dormouse is asleep again,” said the Hatter, and he poured a little hot tea upon its nose.
- A Mad Tea Party from Alice in Wonderland
Whether done by those who are quite mad or otherwise sane, the pouring of tea has been a custom for thousands of years, since its alleged discovery in 2737 BC by Chinese Emperor Shen Nung. This was quite accidental, as a tea leaf is said to have fallen into a bowl of hot water he was drinking. In 1716 AD, the first tea shipment arrived in Canada, imported by the Hudson Bay Co. This was certainly no accident.
Also no accident are the minions of collectors of teapots worldwide, such as Cote St. Luc accountant Maryse El-malem, who has allowed her love for tea and its paraphernalia to become an obsession.
What is remarkable about her collection, which she numbers at more than 1,000, is that it has been assembled over a very short span of time.
“In 1993, after my husband had passed away the same year I lost my father and mother, I was in Australia and I visited a few stores that sold teapots,” Elmalem said.
“I said to my sister that I needed a hobby, something to keep my thoughts focused on anything but the terrible year I had gone through. I saw this cute teapot in a window, a shoe-house with a little mouse inside. I fell in love with it and bought it on the spot. It was my first yixing teapot and cost me about $110.”
Since then, the mother of three adult children has spent countless thousands on teapots of every size and descrip-tion. Many have been purchased in other countries - England is a hotbed of collectible teapots, Elmalem pointed out, proudly showing off a Laurel and Hardy teapot she purchased at Harrod’s - but many she also buys through her favou-rite mail-order supplier, Cardew Design, founded by Paul Cardew. His designs are done for his own line, but also for companies like Royal Doulton and Disney, with his zisha teapots produced at the Cardew Studio Range in Woodmanton Farm, England.
Cardew’s teapots, counting the collector’s item you receive for joining the club at an annual cost of $80, are shown in the catalogue mailed to you quarterly. You also obtain up to 25 per cent in discounts for purchases, making the cost worthwhile for Elmalem. She is always waiting for a teapot to arrive and was eagerly anticipating delivery of six new ones.
“Let me show you the one teapot I want more than anything,” she said, opening her Cardew catalogue to the page with an admittedly stunning image. Called Eterni-Tea, it’s in fact a sculpture of an Atlas-like male, supporting a three-dimensional, gold-lustred teapot globe on his back. The price? A lofty $ 3,995 U.S., numbered and limited to only 500 worldwide. “I’m dying to have it,” she admitted, adding, however, that at this price she might have met her match.
Limited editions are what attract most collectors, meaning they are all numbered and limited in production, as well as occasionally signed by their artist. Fitz and Floyd is a popular producer of limited editions, including a line of six famous international churches, of which Elmalem is missing only one. Her Notre Dame Cathedral, based on the one in Paris, is particularly striking.
Also very eye-catching are the many teapots, many of them limited editions, based on Warner Brothers’ zany ani-mated characters like Bugs Bunny, Tweety Bird and Pepe Le Pew to name just a few, plus some representing classic TV shows such as I Love Lucy.
Do you like rodents? Disney features teapots with mice like Mickey and other famous characters. Some teapots even play a tune when wound, much like music boxes. Interestingly enough, Elmalem added that many teapots are made in Sri Lanka today, making that country a kind of mecca for collectors.
In addition to the mail, Elmalem buys her teapots at Montreal stores, when she can find them. Her second purchase was made at a store in the Le Rouet chain. The Linen Chest carries some lovely ones, including limited editions, as does the Shayne Gallery in Town of Mount Royal, which showcases one-of-a-kind items created by local and other Canadian artists, like Quebec’s Gary Merkel and Ontario’s Lorie Schinko. The Montreal Museum of Fine Arts gift shop also might yield a treasure or two.
Department stores like The Bay have interesting teapots on occasion, but not limited editions.
The Internet auction site eBay is another popular source for teapots, but Elmalem issued a warning. “Many of these are not packaged properly and are broken during shipping, so it’s best to stick to a reputable dealer.”
Will she ever stop collecting? “Not as long as I breathe,” Elmalem said. “My life is based on teapots now. Through them, I’ve developed friendships, relationships. … On special occasions in my life, people know teapots are my pas-sion.”
Nicky Fambios of Laval also collects teapots, although her more modest, albeit impressive, collection numbers in the low hundreds. The working mother of two young boys considers herself an “informed amateur,” who started hun-grily gobbling up information about teapots after she discovered how beautiful they can be.
“In the past, I saw teapots as purely functional, not really decorative or collectible,” Fambios said. “Then, a couple of years ago, a friend was getting married in Creemore, north of Toronto, and I went into the little village and stopped by a small tea shop, which sold these. I was really smitten with them.”
Fambios began doing research online and became a collector, learning what makes certain pieces more collectible and valuable than others. “For instance,” she said, “the Hall China Company is the largest manufacturer of teapots in the U.S. They make the popular Aladdin teapots (shaped like genie lamps) in cobalt blue … a five-cup size sells for about $ 300 and is limited. The cream-coloured ones are worth a lot less, because they are not limited.
“Then there are the renowned Yixing teapots, which come from a tiny village of the same name in China. These are highly sought after because they come in many aesthetically pleasing and artistic shapes. They are also porous on the inside and absorb the flavour of the tea brewed within. For that reason, it is not recommended that you brew more than one type of tea per pot.” Yixing’s Zisha teapots are available in 110 different designs and are fashioned from a purple or red clay that is only found in Jiangsu province.

ZishaTeapot.co.uk is a leading online retailer of quality Yixing Teapots and tea accessories. We were established in 2006 in the city of Yixing Zisha teapots China. The people at ZishaTeapot.co.uk are dedicated to providing our customers with a complete China Teapots experience. Along with our fine selections of Zisha Teapots, we also offer elegant tea sets and beautiful teacups. Not only will we offer a wonderful selection at a great value, but we also strive to educate on the many health benefits of tea and Chinese tea culture.

ZishaTeapot.co.uk is a leading online retailer of quality Zisha Teapots and tea accessories. We were established in 2006 in the city of Yixing China. The people at ZishaTeapot.co.uk are dedicated to providing our customers with a complete China Teapots experience. Along with our fine selections of Chinese Zisha Teapots, we also offer elegant tea sets and beautiful teacups. Not only will we offer a wonderful selection at a great value, but we also strive to educate on the many health benefits of tea and Chinese tea culture.

LIKE the drinking of tea, collecting yixing teapots can become an addiction. But it is a popular one among those who consider a few pieces of fine art, or even fine craftwork, to be an asset in any investment portfolio.
While the debate about whether or not art is an investment goes on with no conclusion, serious buyers continue to bid high prices at Sotheby’s and Christie’s auctions. Others haunt galleries, while the would-be art collectors scour mar-kets for a piece to get them started.
And while it is, admittedly, more difficult to dissolve artwork into cash than it is with gold or diamonds, art has a value which is difficult to define in dollars.
Art, like any commodity, has a value depending on who wants to buy and who wants to sell.
While it may not always be useful in the same way as commodities coffee and rice, or practical as in platinum or diamonds, or even find an equal exchange as in the money markets (”your Picasso will never equal my Monet”), it will be as keenly monitored and carefully guarded as any asset in the world of high finance.
The value of most commodities reflects their rarity, the need for them, or the ease with which they can be traded.
Art, though, has a special place. Does any broker or investor love his blue chip stock, appreciate looking at his government bonds or enjoy showing off his forex account to dinner guests in the same way the art collector draws at-tention to his original Van Gogh hanging on the wall?
As Mr Charles Garnett, sales and marketing manager for Altfield Interiors, points out, the benefit of investing in art is double-edged.
It has both aesthetic appeal and intelligently chosen pieces can return high yields.
“In other words, one of the criteria for buying a painting, or a piece of ceramic, should be that you like it,” said Mr Garnett.
Like any investment, every piece of art carries the risk that someone else might not be prepared to pay more than you paid for it.
Of all assets, art is personal and in the eye of the beholder. To buy strictly for investment is a trap.
And, even having chosen a piece which is original or at least beautiful, there is no guarantee that he will not fall out of love with it as fashions and interior decoration changes. This is where perspective - buying objectively - comes into the equation.
And a collector should not expect that a painting will simply appreciate.
“If you are buying a piece expecting a return in less than five years, you will most likely be disappointed,” said Mr Garnett.
But art is as prone to fluctuations in market availability and demand as any commodity. The death of an artist can, overnight, turn valuable paintings into priceless museum pieces.
And when one collector hordes a collection, a decision to sell it in its entirety rather than as separate work can send the value escalating.
So, there is the theory. In practice, art is affordable to the common man.  With no talk of minimum amounts of US$ 1 million required to start an “artfolio”, it is both a pleasurable and lucrative means of investment.
And, according to Mr Garnett, just $ 10,000 is enough to put you in the picture.
Mr Garnett’s favourite choice is in Chinese and Tibetan collectables for the obvious reason that, in Hongkong, people are on the doorstep to a treasure house of such works.
“You could say such pieces are undervalued,” said Mr Garnett.
“And interest in collecting Chinese artworks is spreading as the Chinese population disperses throughout Canada and the United States, concentrating in New York, San Francisco and Vancouver.”
What will $ 10,000 buy?
A painting from popular contemporary Chinese artist, Je Hegen, entitled Portrait of a Bai Woman could be had for $ 4,700. Works from Shanghainese artist Yong Ping, which were selling for around $ 5,500 three years ago, now fetch $ 9,000.
Similarly, a painting by 22-year-old Wu Yang could be hanging on your wall for $ 5,500 and gaining in value.
These were the artists favoured by Mr Garnett and could be found in the J R Guttinger gallery in Central and Zeestone gallery in Exchange Square.
Other low-priced purchases include tsampa bowls from Tibet. These burwood and silver bowls, used for mixing butter, tea and barley, vary in price, depending on how ornate they are, from $ 2,500 up to $ 9,000.
Ironically, perhaps, the value to the Tibetans is not in the silver, but in the wood which is a rarer commodity in their country.
But buying art, as with any equity, is not for the uninitiated. Mr Garnett warns that reproduction bowls are pro-duced in Nepal and it is difficult to spot the authentic from the fake tsampa , although those from Nepal tended to be newer.
But, Mr Garnett added, galleries such as Zeestone, Plum Blossoms, Altfield and Teresa Coleman, where such ar-tefacts could be found, would not be guilty of selling these reproductions.
He said the value increased depending on whether the silver was the rarer carved silver or moulded.
And what about those teapots?
According to Ms Mee Seen-loong of Sotheby’s, with $ 10,000 and a lot of patience, a collector could secure sev-eral fine examples of Yixing teapots.
The town of Yixing is in the small county of Jiangsu and, of the 50,000 population, 13,000 are engaged in the manufacture of ceramics.
Yixing teapots are made from three basic clays of the dozen in the area. They are zisha (purple), banshanlu (light brown) and zhusha (red).
These teapots date back to the Ming dynasty and the most valuable are those which bear the mark or painting of the potter.
The number of teapots made in the Ming Dynasty was small and the workmanship demanded by an elite clientele was high. Almost every item was a masterpiece and, today, represents a potted history of tea-making in Chinese as well as an attractive investment.

ZishaTeapot.co.uk is a leading online retailer of quality Yixing Teapots and tea accessories. We were established in 2006 in the city of Yixing Zisha teapots China. The people at ZishaTeapot.co.uk are dedicated to providing our customers with a complete China Teapots experience. Along with our fine selections of Zisha Teapots, we also offer elegant tea sets and beautiful teacups. Not only will we offer a wonderful selection at a great value,
but we also strive to educate on the many health benefits of tea and Chinese tea culture.

Ah, the charm of a small city! There are many cities this size in China, but many are nondescript and do not possess  distinctive features. Yixing, in East China’s Jiangsu Province, suffers from the opposite headache: It has so many  resources it can use to promote tourism and it is sometimes at a loss what to highlight.
For most Chinese, Yixing is synonymous with zisha teapots, the dark brown, unglazed and small-sized ware pop-ular among tea aficionados. “Zisha” literally means “purple clay“, which is the raw material for the namesake pottery and is available only in the Yixing vicinity.
You don’t have to like tea to enjoy Yixing, though, and you don’t have to splurge thousands of yuan on a pot to pour tea from. As a matter of fact, zisha teapots have evolved from mainly functional to predominantly decorative or even artistic, and the really unique ones have become collector’s items and indeed are pricey.
A walk down the main street in Dingshu, a small town in the southern suburb of Yixing, is like a journey into a zi-sha pottery paradise. There are 1,000-plus workshops in this “capital of pottery”, employing some 30,000 people. Here, pottery-making goes back 7,000 years and the current kind of zisha ware first appeared in the Song Dynasty (960-1279).
It is all made possible by the special zisha clay endowed by Mother Nature. “You can imitate our craftsmanship,  but you cannot reproduce the clay,” says one zisha maker. The preparation of the clay and the sculpting has remained the same throughout centuries, but there is only one kiln still in working condition.
Called “dragon kiln”, it goes up a slope, with evenly placed holes on both sides of a hump, that resemble the scales of a dragon. However, kilns require special firewood and can be polluting. They have been replaced by electric stoves, which make it easier to control the temperature and yield better-quality ware, and lessen the burden on labor and the environment.
Teapots go with tea, and Yixing tea is a hidden secret. It is around here that Lu Yu (AD 733-804) of the Tang Dy-nasty (AD 618-907) wrote his Tea Bible. Yet, a statue of Lu stands forlornly by the roadside, in front of a vast rolling meadow of tea shrubbery.
“Though accounting for 40 percent of tea production in Jiangsu Province, Yixing tea does not figure prominently  in the local economy,” says a guide.
Even when you totally ignore the tea and teapot, Yixing is a wonderful weekend getaway for busy city slickers. It is  situated on the northwest side of Taihu Lake, roughly at the center of a radius that links Nanjing, Wuxi, Suzhou, of Jiangsu Province, Shanghai, and Hangzhou of Zhejiang Province, one of the economic hotspots in the nation.
According to the Chinese, water adds sparkle to a place. In addition to being upstream of the famous lake, Yixing has three expanses of water so unique that a special word was coined to describe it. “Jiu” refers to something smaller than a lake but larger than a river.
A 4.5-sq-km jiu has been turned into the diamond of a downtown park. Residents stroll around the meticulously landscaped gardens, exquisite pavilions and across a dozen singularly shaped bridges. And at night buildings along the lake are tastefully lit, exuding an aura of fairyland.
This is not the only mammoth urban park. The other two lagoons are also being developed. The 5.5-sq-km Dragon Ridge Forest Park offers a perfect combination of natural habitat, multiple museums and a playground, with a newly rebuilt 108m pagoda to boot.
As the old saying goes, kind people prefer mountains and wise ones adore water. Yixing has both. Its mountains are covered with bamboo forests and conceal caves of rock formations. Shanjuan, the best known of the 80-something caves, has cavernous halls which look like a giant movie set.
It is rare for a place of 2,000 sq km and 1 million people, including suburbs, to have so much delight for both resi-dents and visitors. The capital of pottery, the town on waterways, home to southern elegance, the birthplace of thou-sands of the nation’s top educators Above all, it offers poetic tranquility tucked away, yet so close to the boisterous boomtowns of the Yangtze River Delta.

A group of folk artists from Yixing, East China’s Jiangsu Province, have announced plans in Beijing  early this week to launch a project to promote the centuries-old art of Zisha (purple clay) teapot.
Renowned master Zisha teapot maker He Daohong and his followers including Tang Jianguo and Zhu Jianping have teamed  up with veteran Chinese artists of seal making, ink painting, and calligraphy, to launch a website (www.china-juya.com)   to give Chinese art lovers, especially the younger generations, a new way of understanding and appreciating Zisha  pottery.
For centuries, Chinese folk artists have delicately handcrafted the elegant Yixing teapots, which are closely related  to Chinese tea ceremony.
These teapots are carefully sculpted from Zisha clay, a material indigenous to the region of Yixing, about 120 miles   northwest of Shanghai.
The Zisha clay contains minerals which naturally produce a variety of earthy hues, ranging from pale golden yel-low to  a soothing shade of deep purple. Left unglazed, the clay absorbs the natural wholesome flavour of infused tea leaves.  Each Yixing Zisha teapot is seasoned over time. Small pores in the clay, combined with the low shrinkage rate, allow the  pottery makers to create a tight fitting lid for each teapot; and Zisha clay is also able to retain heat.
With only about 4 per cent water absorption rate, very low thermal conductivity, and a double air-hole design, Yix-ing  Zisha teapots easily uphold their reputation as the best tea brewing vessels among lovers of Chinese tea art and  collectors of teapots, explained He.
“Zisha pottery art has long been relegated to a small number of collectors. With this project, we hope to make  the ancient art more popular among ordinary Chinese,” said He. An interactive online programme will enable art  lovers to participate in the initial design of unique Zisha teapots. But the teapots will eventually be made in pottery   studios in Yixing, cradle of Zisha pottery.
Ningbo Italian photographer Italian photographer Amalia Pellegrini’s solo exhibition ended early this month in  the port city of Ningbo in East China’s Zhejiang Province.
As part of the celebrations for the 700th anniversary of Italian adventurer Marco Polo’s travels and life in  ancient China, the month-long solo photo show was held at the Ningbo Museum of Modern Arts which has four exhibits by  Pellegrini.

yan'an, once china's revolutionary mecca in northwest china's shaanxi province, has produced high-quality pottery that sells well across the country.  the area is rich in a special earth called 'zisha' that contains a variety of rare miner-als and makes good pottery. experts say that yan'an pottery is as good as pottery produced in yixing in east china's jiangsu province. yixing zisha pottery is reputed to be the best in china.  so far, more than 100 kinds of earthenware including teapots, wine vessels, smoking vessels and construction materials, have been produced in local pottery facto-ries.  officials said that yan'an pottery products are selling well in more than 20 provinces and municipalities in china. businessmen from hong kong, macao and taiwan have also come to order the products.  yan'an was where mao zedong and his army were based in the '30s and '40s. however, due to its remoteness from cities and bad natural conditions, it remained relatively poor for the past four decades.