Alongside porcelain decorated with family crests or religious scenes, tableware painted with ships and marine views was also fashionable and made to order in Jingdezhen and Canton, from the 1730s to the early 19th century. Captains, merchants and passengers aboard British and Dutch East India Company ships would commission enamelled illustrations of the ships on which they would have spent months, if not years. These porcelain wares would essentially become keepsakes of their journeys and likely sparked conversation around the dinner or tea table. This teapot is painted with a three-mast sailing ship bearing British flags, and were thus likely commissioned by a British passenger or member of the British East India Company.
