COLLECTING HONEY POTS
Ellie Tennant uncovers some sweet treats
James Hamill, Master Beekeeper and Founder of The Hive Honey Shop in London, knows a thing or two about honey pots. ‘My grandfather was a beekeeper and my family has been collecting bee items for 100 years, so I grew up around antique honey pots,’ he explains.
James has amassed a vast bee-related collection that spans coins from 400BC with bees embossed on them, ancient Egyptian mud beehives from the time of the pharaohs and elegant vintage basketwork beehives known as ‘skeps’. But it’s his stash of ‘around 700’ honey pots that captivates him the most.
In the early days, James mostly bought at auction, but today he !nds his honey pots via word of mouth and the "ow shows no sign of slowing. ‘We just got out another
!ve crates of honey pots and we’re slowly trying to get them up on the website,’ he says.
Early, rare honey pots occasionally come up at auction and can fetch huge sums. For example, a Sta#ordshire slipware honey pot c1700 sold for £3,800 in 2019 at Woolley & Wallis. But most of the honey pots on the market date from the early 20th century and are more a#ordable. ‘There was a huge surge when po$ery began to be mass-produced in the early 1900s,’ explains James. ‘The old British makers like Crown Devon, Brunswick, Poole Po$ery, Clarice Cli# and Shorter & Son all made beautiful honey pots, and designs by these names are highly sought a"er. They all had their own pa$erns and styles and that’s what makes collecting honey pots so exciting.’
Collector John Doyle founded The European Honey Pot Collectors’ Society, is the author of Collecting Honey Pots, and has 3,000 honey pots in his personal collection, which spans the Victorian era to the 1900s. ‘My favourites are Japanese Marutomoware ones, which date from the 1920s and 1930s,’ he says. ‘They’re cream, bright yellow or green and decorated with beautiful hollyhocks.’
John says that the huge array of materials used for honey pots means that they are particularly interesting to collect. ‘They come in ceramic, earthenware, stoneware, china, porcelain, acrylic and even wood, silver and pewter (with glass liners).’
This variety appeals to collector Camille Fiorillo, too, who has an impressive selection of honey pots stacked in various cabinets around her San Antonio home. ‘Honey pots were made in all sorts of materials,’ she says. ‘I have ceramic ones, glass ones, silver ones and a wooden one from Russia, too.’ Camille says her collection is still growing. ‘It’s such a thrill when you !nd one you don’t already have!’
Honey pots are going up in terms of popularity and price. ‘Finding a perfect honey pot gets harder over time,’ explains James. ‘They get broken easily, so if Wedgwood made 5,000 honey pots in 1930, there aren’t many le" intact today. Prices go up as more get damaged over time.’ Lots of pots have a bee on the top as the handle, which makes them quite vulnerable. ‘Wings get chipped easily,’ James points out. ‘Also, if somebody doesn’t li" the lid completely, the spoon hits the lid, so you o"en get chips around the cut-out hole on the interior.’
An entrylevel honey pot can cost as li$le as £10. ‘That would get you something like a Portuguese Secla honey pot from the 1970s,’ says James. ‘But you can pay £5,000 to £10,000 for older pots in good condition. For example, silver 17th-century honey pots always fetch large sums. In my opinion, bricks and mortar and honey pots are the best investments these days!’
Collectors are quite particular about what actually constitutes a honey pot: it has to have a bee on it or have a clear connection with bees, such as being in the shape of a beehive. ‘If it’s got fruits on it or is just a general pot that could be used for jam, true connoisseurs aren’t interested,’ says James.
As with all collecting, one thing can all too easily lead to another. ‘Other honey containers are always of interest. For example, there are glass honey bo$les (o"en from America) which would have been sealed with corks, and honey tins – a bit like syrup tins,’ enthuses James. ‘To !nd one with the paper label intact is very rare.’
Collector Camille says her obsession has spilled over into other areas, too – she has accumulated bee-shaped salt and pepper shakers, has paintings of bees on her walls and uses skepshaped biscuit barrels.
John Doyle has a thing for square wooden or ceramic ‘section boxes’, which were used for transporting and serving chunks of honeycomb. ‘I’ve seen Cine Film footage showing Lord Lucan serving cut comb from a Crown Devon section box for breakfast,’ he says. Then, there are honey spoons, too. ‘Some honey pots were manufactured with a matching spoon and those that survive with their original spoons are worth more today than those that have lost their spoons,’ explains James. ‘I have wooden honey dippers, spoons – I just found a tiny silver spoon with a bee on the handle – there is no
end. My wife has begged me: please, no more collecting!’
James’s most treasured honey pot is a 1930s one from Buckfast Abbey, the monastery where Brother Adam (who bred a disease-resistant ‘super-bee’ and is credited with saving British bees) lived and worked. ‘It’s a waxed conical container with an embossed picture of the monastery and a monk,’ describes James. ‘They’re impossible to come by. It’s so fragile and full of history. An antiques dealer came into my shop one day and showed me a pristine one with the top still in place. It’s in my glass case of treasured items.’
But the rest of his honey pots are not purely decorative. ‘I have a few at home I can’t part with,’ he admits. ‘I rotate them around the kitchen. I’m using a delicate glass beehive honey pot dating from 1910 with a metal bee on the top at the moment. I use them; they don’t just sit in a box or on a shelf.’
It takes a worker bee a lifetime to make just one twel!h of a teaspoon of honey, so it’s a precious substance – a real luxury. ‘It’s quick and easy just to serve honey straight from a jar, but there’s something special about taking the top o" a beautiful honey pot and treating the honey with the respect that it deserves,’ muses James. ‘It’s a bit like the Japanese making tea with time and care, rather than just plonking a tea bag in a mug. I think a proper honey pot makes the honey taste be#er, too!’