A sugar bowl is a bowl, usually lidded, made to hold sugar at the tea or dining table. It became a standard part of the tea equipage in the eighteenth century, as tea drinking spread through polite society and sugar from Caribbean plantations became more widely available, and it was made in silver, porcelain, pottery and glass.
Early silver sugar bowls were often modest circular bowls with a cover that could be inverted to serve as a stand. By the later eighteenth century Neoclassical taste produced elegant boat-shaped and pierced sugar baskets with swing handles, frequently fitted with blue glass liners, while Regency and Victorian examples became larger and more richly decorated to match full tea services of teapot, milk jug and sugar bowl. Sugar was bought in loaves and broken with nips, then lifted with tongs, and these accessories are collected alongside the bowls themselves. Collectors check hallmarks on the bowl and cover, which should agree, look for crisp decoration and good weight, and watch for repairs to piercing and handles. Glass liners are often replacements, which does not usually matter greatly. A Georgian sugar bowl is equally at home on a tea tray or used as a small dish on a dressing table.
