Early English Tin-Glazed Gallipot ; London, c.1700.

Early English Tin-Glazed Gallipot ; London, c.1700.

Selling drugs has always been big business. Eighteenth century chemists knew all too well that storing drugs in tastefully decorated pots would draw customers into their shops ; thus increasing profits.

This very demure example with concentric bands on a pale duck egg blue ground is one of the more iconic London apothecary wares ; a popular choice with the fashionable chemists of eighteenth century England.

‘…There is no branch of business, in which a man requires less money to set him up, than this very profitable trade : Ten or twenty pounds, judiciously applied, will buy gallipots and as many drugs to fill them with as might poison the whole island. ‘

An excerpt from ‘The London Tradesmen’ 1747.