Biedermeier coffee service, Deutschheim Historic Site.
Biedermeier coffee service. The Germans loved their coffee in the afternoon and, in fact, one of the things they missed most about coming to America was that they didn’t have coffeehouses to go to. So they brought with them objects that they valued, such as coffee services. So these lovely teacups here of the Biedermeier period in 1830s, 1840s, and the lovely porcelain has illustrations of landscapes or the rothouse in Germany, something that they particularly admired. So the Biedermeier tradition was to have coffee in the afternoon where you would have welcomed your guests and everyone would have sat around and conversed in the afternoon.
Many of the Germans brought with them in their immigrant trunks items that they cherished from their homeland. Oftentimes they might be living in a small log cabin in Missouri, but on the hearth would be an object that they had brought with them that was particularly important. And an example we have at Deutschheim is the Chinese export teapot here that would have been something beautiful they would have brought from their homeland and would have been displayed in a nice room like this from the Biedermeier period or might have been in a log cabin out on forty acres.
