Those old (and new) tea catalogs

Do you save old tea catalogs? I do, and I have several uses for them.

1. The covers are often pretty (Harney's and Bigelow's are especially nice), and these may be framed and used as artwork on the walls of the tearoom I plan to open one day.

2. They provide a cultural history of tea. Ten years from now, will white teas and rooibos still be popular? Will new tea accoutrements have appeared?

3. Tea catalogs are a good source for photos and graphics that can be used in collage art and various crafty things.

The Harney & Sons catalog for Fall 2007 has arrived, by the way, and is lovely as usual. The paper is a nice, thick stock, the photos are appealing, the layout is clear and easy to navigate. This is really an excellent catalog. I opened it and was reminded I am out of their Cranberry Autumn tea, a seasonal favorite. (I'm going to a tearoom this weekend and hope to find some there. If not, I'll mail order.) And I still have warm memories of the time I needed some of their Wedding Tea for a bridal shower I was giving. I had failed to order until the last minute and wrote a note to that effect on my online order. They shipped the tea out that very day and enclosed a note saying they hoped the bridal shower went well. Imagine that! (But then I've found this sort of customer service often in the tea world.)