What are teaparties made of?

A little bit of cake...

A splash of sparkling wine...

Touch of scandal...

A good amount of dignity...

And plenty of fun!

Thank all of you lovely ladies for being my guests! I hope we can do this again.

Madame Parapluie

Ps. Photos by Sanni Siira so no using without permission. 

My first very own tea blend

Today I finished the second batch of my very own tea blend which I call Mist over the Hills as it becomes rather misty in the cup. The blend has some lavender and toffee mixed to a black tea.
 I decided to try making my own blend when my favorite autumn tea ran out (and after I had discovered that it had also been discontinued). I think Mist over the Hills came out quite nicely. It has a very nice flowery taste with some creaminess from the toffee.

Madame Parapluie

My teaset: Asian royal blue sets

This time the post will be a little different as I like to use these two sets as one, because their themes are so close to each other and they do go together very well. I got these cups from my grandmother which does add to their charm. I am hoping that at somepoint I will find a teapot that will compliment these cups. 

Click for a better view

So here are the cups. As you can see the porcelain is very thin, practicly see through and the decorative motifs match nicely. On the cup of the left we see cherry blossoms and on the right women in kimonos with parasols.

The cherry blossoms have been made with these beautiful straight lines that give the motif a nice sense of dimension and shade. I fell this motif is very cute, but the striking blue colour makes it very elegant.

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The lady motif is a bit more intrivate. All the women have differently patterent kimonos and dainty parasols. The branch pictured here makes me wonder if the women are taking a stroll among the cherry blossoms tying the two different sets together nicely. 

Both motifs feature an intricate border design. On the kimono cup it features multiple different flowers while in the cherry cup only one flover design is used. Both have a back ground of tilted lines making it more detailed as opposed to a solid back ground. This technique gives the motif some breathing room making it seem less heavy. 

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 The handles of the cups are very dainty, allowing the holder only a finger through them. The have some nice petters in them matching the borders on the cups. I find these cups to be very feminine.

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The stamps of the cups. The kimono cups stamp matches the stamps on the saucers but the cherry blossom cup has a different stamp which is rather odd. 

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The patterns on the saucers are very organic and not centered around the center point. I find this makes the plates more interesting. As in the cups you can see the intricate border design. 

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The blossoms on the saucer look less imposing than in the cup. They seem to have buds instead of flowers in full bloom. I enjoy the amount of white on the saucers as it balances the patter out nicely and makes it almost like a play of light and shadow, reminding me of a graphics leaf. 

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The beauty of the kimono pattern comes out really nicely on the saucer. It is clearly a scene of an afternoon walk between some very fine ladies. You can almost here the one on the checker pattern kimono to speak to her companions. Truly quite charming.

Here is the stamp on the plates and on the kimono cup. It features a crown with and S under it and the place of origin for the set. I don't know which company this stamp belongs to but if any of you have any information please do share. 

As I said before I feel this set is very ladylike and feminine, reminding me of some of the earliest teacups, which were chinese. The blue and white colour combination is very fine and nicely done. All in all it is very classy set which I love to use. Next time we have some Russian peacocks which are much more pompous than these.

Madame Parapluie

Royal High tea

 

 

 

Some visions of me recent teaparty.

Mademoiselle Parapluie

Ps. Pictures belong to Sanni. So no using them without permission from her.

My teaset: The royal blue Lomonosov

Once again, dear readers I shall talk about my teacups. This time we have one of my personal favorites, the Lomonosov royal blue set. I only own cups and plates from this series and would certainly be glad to have atleast a pot to match.

As you can see the shape of this cup is simpler than the cup from the net set I shared with you earlier, but what this lacks in shape it makes up with gilding.

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 This cup has quite a wide gilded border around its rim. The border is quite intriquate which adds to the cup's charm and gives a regal feeling, combined with the blue. The glaze on this cup is quite polished making it even more striking.

The handle of the cup follows the same rules of simplicity of shape and has no gilding. It's quite easy to grasp and feels nice on your hand.

The plate of this set is quite simple in shape too and has a narrower version of the border motif on its rim. The white on the middle matches beautifully to the white inside of the cup. 

And finally here is the stamp of this set. As in the net set it's again sort of reddish brown and again we see that it's made in USSR. I really love this Lomonosov stamp. The monogram on top is so delicate looking and dainty.

Until next time with some more Asian cups!

Mademoiselle Parapluie

My teaset: Asian red set with a fan-like pattern

Click to enlarge

 It's time to get back to my teaset-series. This time I chose to show you the Asian red set. I have three sets of cup, saucer, and a serving plate. It's actually one of my favorite sets and very dfferent from my other ones. 

 I bougth this set from the Vallila fleamarket, years ago and had the misfortune of shattering one of the plates while getting it home. Flowerthief fortunately glued it together so it is still usable.

Click to enlarge

This cup has a really simple shape which is counteracted by a very intricate pattern which covers the cup entirely, inside and out. The colour is reddish orange and is lined with gilding, making the patter even lovelier. The pattern and the bold colours give this set a really Edwardian feel which I like. 

In the center of the cup and plates is a black area covered with a gilded net and dots. The black balances the red shades of the set nicely. 

The handle of the cup is black with gold detailing tying it nicely to the other black accents of this set. It has an elegant curve though it is quite small making it harder to use than the handles of the lomonosov sets.

Click to enlarge

As you can see the bigger plate is less vibrant than the smaller one giving it a calmer, less strong appearance. It also has more black in it than the other pieces of this set.

Here is the stamp of this set. It is clearly Asian, probably Chinese as Japanese stamps feature mount Fuji. If someone can tell me more about I would be glad to hear. The cups don't have stamps.

It's a pitty that there are only three cups in this set for I don't get to use it too often with my friends. So I tend to use this set when I am having tea on my own.  It somehow works nicely with my glass teapot.

Thank you for reading. Next time I will show you one of me Lomonosov cups!

Mademoiselle Parapluie

My Teaset: Pearlecent teapot

I don't know much about this teapot as I cannot identify the stamp on it. I got it from my boyfriend as a graduation present. He purchased it from an antiques shop and it was suggested that it is Russian. I will never part with it as it holds many fond memories.

I very much like the shape of this pot. It is very elegant and the lid has very nice ruffley thingy around it. The shape is very balanced in my opinion. The handle and the spout are porpotioned very nicely and give balance to each other.

The pot has a nice dark brown floral patterned which is rather abstract. It has been painted under the pearlacent glazing. The glaze gives the pot an unique and charming look.

The pot's handle curves rather elegantly and it has a brown accent to make the curve stand out. I do love the twist on the top part of the handle, it gives the elegant pot some much needed detail.

  The little swirl is echoed  in the spout, giving the pot some nice symmetry. The spout is short and has some girth. The spout is also lined with dark brown to make the tip of it stand out.

The lid of the pot is nicely waisted. It once fell to the floor so we had glue it back together but the lines fit in quite nicely.  The tip of the lid is again dark brown giving the pot a cohesive look.

Here is the stamp of the pot but as I said I have no idea where it is from. If some of my readers migth know more about this stamp I would be glad to hear of it. The mystery of this pot has plagued me for years and I hope I can someday solve it.

Mademoiselle Parapluie

Royal unicorns at Ofelia market

Today I attended the lovely Ofelia market which is a trade fair for quirky styles here in Finland! The lovely lady above is Essi from Essin maailma, which is the place for cake jewlery and othr quirky things in life (like that epic shoe headband).

Here is what I wore.

Headband: Bijou Brigitte
Shirt: Seppälä by Paola Suhonen (loan from Mari)
Dress: Hand made by me ( I call it the Unicornia Regalia dress)
Tights: Sokos
Shoes: Wonders

I painted my nails to match the dress.

As you can see I made this dress for Mari too and so we twinned. Also note the epic Unicorn horns, by Essin maailma.

And more Unicorn horns!

Here is the lovely people we hung around with. Lovely Shoeshinee, darling Elfie and her adorable Hubby.

I believe heartily that sooner or later everyone ends up at The Ounce. 

Mademoiselle Parapluie.

New series! My teaset!

As all of you know I love tea. With passion. So I've been thinking of showing you the teacups and other tea related things I have and I realized that making it in one post would make that a very long, very picture heavy post. So I decided that I will show you my teasets one set at a time. Today we are going to look at the set I call Lomonosov net. 

Click the picctures to make them bigger.

The Lomonosov net was the first Russian teaset I got. My mother gave it to me as a Christmas present. I only have the cups and the saucers and hope I would some day get the pot and other things too. As you can sea this set is blue white and gold, which is a reaccurring theme in my teasets. I have other colours too but the majority of my teasets are white and blue with accents of gold.

 Here is the plate of this set. As you can see the pattern is gorgeus and very fluid. The white insert on the middle gives it a ligth and open feel. The blue is painted under the glazing and the gold is added over it. The technique gives the patter some texture but will prevent washing these in a washing machine. 

Here is the cups handle. It is blue and it has some sort of a flower pattern, a lily maybe? The handle is very basic in shape, it has not extra nubs or swirls and it compliments the ornate pattern of the cup quite nicely. 

The inner rim of the cup has a thin gold pattern a half circle with something that resembles a rising sun in it. I like a cup which has a bit of decoration on the inside too. It makes tea time fancier. 

 

And finally the Lomonosov stamp. This one is made in the time of USSR which would make it 1917 to 1992. I really don't know how old these cups are but they are gorgeus so I don't really care.  The mark is reddish brown which I think is good. 

Next time, I will show you one of my teapots!

Mademoiselle Parapluie