If you got married in Britain in the 1960s,
chances are that your wedding gifts would
include one of Robert Welch’s designs. Mid
century was a surprisingly fertile time for
teapot design (see also Danish designer
Arne Jacobsen’s 1967 Cylinda line teapot)
and Welch’s stainless-steel teapots catered
to those who wanted something that
looked unmistakably modern but that was
also made to last. Like many designers of
the period, Welch’s style was inf luenced by
the clean lines of Scandinavian style.
The stainless steel Alveston tea set was
named after the Gloucestershire village
where Welch lived, but the distinctive
shape of the teapot soon gave it another
nickname – Aladdin’s lamp. Its shape isn’t
just about looking stylish: the low centre of
gravity gives it extra stability when being
poured. And, from its precision pouring to
a handle that remains cool to the touch
when in use, you start to get a sense of why
it took Welch four years to perfect. On
balance, it’s a small amount of time to spend
on creating a lifetime of use. No wonder it
remains Welch’s most covetable design.A BIT OF GENIE-US
In Britain you’re surely never more than
ten metres from a Brown Betty. It’s so
ubiquitous that you’ve probably never
questioned its history. And it’s much older
than you think. No, much older. It was in
the late 17th century that a pair of Dutch
brothers figured that the local clay of north
Staffordshire was a thrifty stand-in for
prized Chinese Yixing clay.
The Brown Betty evolved over
subsequent centuries but it was Alcock,
Lindley and Bloor who helped make it an
affordable and efficient mass-market
object from 1919 onwards. But what exactly
makes a Brown Betty a Brown Betty? Ian
McIntyre spent three years researching
them before designing his own. He
discovered that some of its most useful
features, such as a spout that won’t drip,
had been lost over time.
McIntyre’s refined version keeps the
teapot’s heat-retaining clay, the round
shape that allows the tea leaves a good
swirl, and the glaze, which disguises drips.
He added an infuser and ensured it would
easily drain in the dishwasher. “Those felt
in keeping with the object,” he says,
“because the Brown Betty has always been
about working as well as possible.”BRIT CLASSIC REBORN
PHOTOGRAPHY: ALAMY; GETTY IMAGES; TOPFOTO
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