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    • Philosophy of Tea >
      • Harmony
      • Humility
      • Respect
      • Creativity
    • Guidelines for the Host/Hostess >
      • Gathering and Greeting
      • Sharing Stories
      • Sharing Food
      • Sending the Guests Home
    • Guidelines for the Guest >
      • Respect Your Hostess/Host
      • Bring a Gift if You Wish
      • Practice Humility
      • Monitor Your Conversation
      • Arrive with a Grateful Attitude
      • Help if Help is Needed
      • Do Not Criticize
      • Leave Gracefully
      • Send a Thank You Note
    • A Checklist for Planning a Tea Party
    • Teas of the World and How to Make Tea >
      • A Sampling of Teas
      • Herbal Teas and Tisanes
      • How to Make Tea
      • Making Iced Tea
      • Tea Concentrate
      • Brewing Tea for a Crowd
    • Tea Utensils and Accessories >
      • Tea Kettle
      • Tea Pot
      • Tea Cozy
      • Teacups
      • Plates
      • Silverware
      • Teacart
      • Tea Strainer
      • Tea Infuser
      • Three-Tiered Server
      • Cream Pitcher and Sugar Bowl
      • Cake Pedestal
      • Trifle Bowl
      • Jam Pots
      • Serving Dishes, Platters, and Trays
      • Silver Tea Set or Silver Tray
      • Linens
      • Kitchen Equipment for Food Preparation
    • Tea Menu Basics >
      • Sandwiches and Savories
      • Savory Spreads and Dips
      • Scones and Tea Breads >
        • About Lemons
    • Afternoon Tea and the Four Seasons >
      • A Spring Tea
      • An Outdoor Summer Tea
      • An Autumn Afternoon Tea
      • A Winter Afternoon Tea
    • A Calendar of Tea Parties >
      • January: A Japanese New Year’s Tea
      • February: A Valentine’s Day Tea
      • March: A St. Patrick’s Day Irish Tea
      • April: An Easter Tea
      • May: A Mother’s Day Tea
      • June: A Wedding Reception Tea >
        • Lemon Yogurt Wedding Cake
      • July: A Picnic Tea
      • August: A Family Reunion Tea >
        • A North American Family Reunion Tea
        • An Eastern Mediterranean Family Reunion Tea
        • A Kosher Family Reunion Tea
        • A Scandinavian Family Reunion Tea
      • September: An Ozark Farm Harvest Tea
      • October: A Tea to Honor Our Ancestors (Dia de los Muertos)
      • November: A Post Thanksgiving Tea
      • December: A Christmas Tea >
        • In Defense of Fruitcake: Fruitcakes and Candied Fruit
    • A World of Tea Parties >
      • A Chinese Dim Sum Tea
      • A Portuguese Tea
      • A Classic British Afternoon Tea
      • An Indian Chai Party
      • A California Tea
      • A Hawaiian Tea
      • An Italian Tea
      • An American Southern Tea
      • A Russian Tea
      • A French Afternoon Tea
      • A Kosher Tea with Tradional Jewish Foods
    • Afternoon Tea for Special Occasions >
      • An Afternoon Tea for Children
      • A Tea for Our Elders
      • A Honey Bee Tea in the Garden
      • An Urban Tea on the Go
      • Tea for One
      • Afternoon Tea for a Large Group
      • A Vegan Tea
      • A Rose Tea
  • Purchase Recipes
  • Resources
    • Bibliography and Resources
    • Menu and Recipe Index
    • Commercial Food Products
    • Glossary

Guidelines for the Host or Hostess

Gracious Hosting

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Fortified by the precious gifts of harmony, humility, respect and creativity, the hostess turns her thoughts to afternoon tea. A tea party has an organic structure that will guide her as she begins the planning process. This is the same familiar structure that underlies a dinner party, a holiday gathering or a religious service. All of these events are comprised of four elements:

Gathering and Greeting
Sharing Stories
Sharing Food
Sending the Guests Home

A spark of inspiration has been kindled, and the hostess begins to visualize the tea party she wants to host. Does she want to celebrate the beauty of spring after a long winter? Does she want to organize a birthday tea in honor of her best friend? Does she want to affirm tradition by creating a classic British afternoon tea party?  Once she has discerned her   purpose, she will choose her guests. Who would enjoy the event she is planning? Should she invite friends who all know each other, or is there a special person who does not know the others but would enjoy their company? Would the hostess like to include people of various ages from children to elders? Will this be a ladies’ tea, or will gentlemen be invited as well?

Next, she will think about how many guests to invite. The ideal number of guests for a traditional British tea party in one’s living room would be from one to eight. However, if the hostess is brave enough to orchestrate a wedding reception tea for dozens or even hundreds of guests in a large hall or park, she will face the additional tasks of sending out formal invitations and making assigned seating arrangements. The latter requires great sensitivity on the hostess’ part.

The hostess at a large tea party gathering will want to provide the opportunity for people to make new friends. On the other hand, she does not want to seat an individual or a couple with eight other people who have been playing golf together twice a week for the past twenty years and don’t know how to talk about anything else. (Note to golfers: It is insensitive and impolite to discuss your golf game at any non-golf related social gathering.)

The hostess will have to use her intuition, along with her knowledge of her guests’ personalities and interests, to create a harmonious seating arrangement. The worst thing she could do when planning a large gathering, is to provide no seating assignments at all. This would be inviting chaos, and chaos is the opposite of afternoon tea.


Rose wrote this poem to express her appreciation for the almost lost art of decorum. If you are not familiar with this word, look it up in a dictionary. Rose and Kathleen believe that decorum can come to life in the most ordinary situations, such as afternoon tea.


                 Decorum


The table is laid with Battenberg lace
And the china is swirled with ethereal birds
In ivy that circles and returns.
Beside each cup, a silver tea strainer
Rests on a silver stand.
The accouterments glisten and glow
Like mist on roses--
            Marmalade murmuring with amber light
            Deep ruby preserves
            Honey in milk glass
            And Devonshire cream, reclining
            Like a cloud in crystal.
The scones, buttoned up with currants,
And the fragrant ginger cake
Rest decoratively as lovely old  ladies
On white doilies.
The strong dark tea slithers
Through a swan-like spout,
Scenting the afternoon with bergamot.
A spoon tinkles like vesper chimes.
            And for moments on end
            Mayhem is held at bay.


Picture

Tea Party Dessert Recipes
Invitations

Once she has chosen her guests, the hostess will need to invite them. There are no rigid rules about tea party invitations. If the group will be small, a personal oral invitation or a phone call will suffice.  The hostess must make sure that she actually talks to the guest. Voice mail invitations can lead to misunderstandings and no-shows. For this reason, among others, we frown on text message or email invitations, which are far too impersonal for the spirit of afternoon tea.

For large groups, printed invitations will be necessary. If the hostess has the ability to print invitations on her home computer, she could do so, but we emphasize again that all printed invitations should be tasteful and appropriate for the tea’s theme. The best invitation, other than a personal face-to-face invitation, is hand written. The hostess should choose elegant and tasteful stationary and include the date, time, location and a hint as to the tea party’s purpose or theme. Here is a sample:


                You are invited to an afternoon tea to celebrate
                St. Patrick’s Day
                On Sunday, March 17,
                From one to four PM
                At the home of Kathleen Pedulla
                (include address)
                RSVP: (include telephone number)


For a large event, the invitations should be mailed at least a month beforehand. For a small gathering, two weeks should be enough time. However, the location and culture in which the hostess lives will influence her guests’ perception of time. Busy, over-scheduled urbanites might need their invitations more than a month in advance. It is also a nice touch to go to the Post Office and purchase some special stamps for the invitations, such as roses for a wedding tea.

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Copyright © 2015 by Epilogics
  • Home
  • About/Blog
    • Who We Are
    • Our Credentials
    • Tea Travels - Rose's Blog
    • Cakes and Tea - Kathleen's Blog
    • Contact Us
  • The Tea Book
    • The Road Back to Civilization
    • A Brief History of Tea
    • Philosophy of Tea >
      • Harmony
      • Humility
      • Respect
      • Creativity
    • Guidelines for the Host/Hostess >
      • Gathering and Greeting
      • Sharing Stories
      • Sharing Food
      • Sending the Guests Home
    • Guidelines for the Guest >
      • Respect Your Hostess/Host
      • Bring a Gift if You Wish
      • Practice Humility
      • Monitor Your Conversation
      • Arrive with a Grateful Attitude
      • Help if Help is Needed
      • Do Not Criticize
      • Leave Gracefully
      • Send a Thank You Note
    • A Checklist for Planning a Tea Party
    • Teas of the World and How to Make Tea >
      • A Sampling of Teas
      • Herbal Teas and Tisanes
      • How to Make Tea
      • Making Iced Tea
      • Tea Concentrate
      • Brewing Tea for a Crowd
    • Tea Utensils and Accessories >
      • Tea Kettle
      • Tea Pot
      • Tea Cozy
      • Teacups
      • Plates
      • Silverware
      • Teacart
      • Tea Strainer
      • Tea Infuser
      • Three-Tiered Server
      • Cream Pitcher and Sugar Bowl
      • Cake Pedestal
      • Trifle Bowl
      • Jam Pots
      • Serving Dishes, Platters, and Trays
      • Silver Tea Set or Silver Tray
      • Linens
      • Kitchen Equipment for Food Preparation
    • Tea Menu Basics >
      • Sandwiches and Savories
      • Savory Spreads and Dips
      • Scones and Tea Breads >
        • About Lemons
    • Afternoon Tea and the Four Seasons >
      • A Spring Tea
      • An Outdoor Summer Tea
      • An Autumn Afternoon Tea
      • A Winter Afternoon Tea
    • A Calendar of Tea Parties >
      • January: A Japanese New Year’s Tea
      • February: A Valentine’s Day Tea
      • March: A St. Patrick’s Day Irish Tea
      • April: An Easter Tea
      • May: A Mother’s Day Tea
      • June: A Wedding Reception Tea >
        • Lemon Yogurt Wedding Cake
      • July: A Picnic Tea
      • August: A Family Reunion Tea >
        • A North American Family Reunion Tea
        • An Eastern Mediterranean Family Reunion Tea
        • A Kosher Family Reunion Tea
        • A Scandinavian Family Reunion Tea
      • September: An Ozark Farm Harvest Tea
      • October: A Tea to Honor Our Ancestors (Dia de los Muertos)
      • November: A Post Thanksgiving Tea
      • December: A Christmas Tea >
        • In Defense of Fruitcake: Fruitcakes and Candied Fruit
    • A World of Tea Parties >
      • A Chinese Dim Sum Tea
      • A Portuguese Tea
      • A Classic British Afternoon Tea
      • An Indian Chai Party
      • A California Tea
      • A Hawaiian Tea
      • An Italian Tea
      • An American Southern Tea
      • A Russian Tea
      • A French Afternoon Tea
      • A Kosher Tea with Tradional Jewish Foods
    • Afternoon Tea for Special Occasions >
      • An Afternoon Tea for Children
      • A Tea for Our Elders
      • A Honey Bee Tea in the Garden
      • An Urban Tea on the Go
      • Tea for One
      • Afternoon Tea for a Large Group
      • A Vegan Tea
      • A Rose Tea
  • Purchase Recipes
  • Resources
    • Bibliography and Resources
    • Menu and Recipe Index
    • Commercial Food Products
    • Glossary