The Duke of Buckingham Tea and Coffee Service

This sophisticated tea and coffee service in the early Greco-Egyptian taste consists of a large tea urn, a teapot, a coffeepot on stand, a milk jug, and a sugar bowl. Each component of the service is engraved with the crest of the dukes of Buckingham and Chandos of Stowe: a green garb (i.e. a sheaf of wheat) surmounted by a ducal coronet. The crests must have been engraved after 1822, which is when George IV elevated Richard Temple-Nugent-Brydges-Chandos-Grenville, Marquess of Buckingham (1776-1839) to the rank of duke.



The service itself was made between 1804 (tea urn, milk jug and sugar bowl) and 1805 (teapot and coffeepot on stand) by the partnership of Digby Scott and Benjamin Smith II, active together between 1802 and 1807. The most imposing element of the service is a large and heavy tea urn, which is closely associated with a design in the collection of the Victoria & Albert Museum by Jean-Jacques Boileau, who was one of several Frenchmen who came to London in the aftermath of the Peace of Amiens of 1802 to be employed by the Francophile future Prince Regent for the decoration of Carlton House. At least seven urns of the same design can be traced, all of which are associated with the collections of high-ranking court officials or significant arbiters of taste, such as Thomas Hope, a vanguard of Britain’s aesthetic engagement with Ancient Egypt. The Met’s version appears to be the earliest example.



Digby Scott and Benjamin Smith’s partnership lasted from ca.1802 to 1807. Together they entertained a workshop at Greenwich, supplying many of their works directly to Rundell, Bridge & Rundell, royal goldsmith from 1797 to 1843, and then London’s most respected retailer in gold and silver.