In Focus: The Social and Cultural History of Biscuit Tins

Starting in the 1830s, purveyors of biscuits or cookies such as Huntley&Palmers in England started distributing their products in brightly-colored tin containers. Over the next hundred years, the market for biscuits and their tins grew to vast proportions, with thousands of variations on the medium entering the supply chain. The decoration and shaping of the tins reflect the most significant artistic and decorative trends of the period, inspired by designers such as Owen Jones and adapting imagery from the Aesthetic Movement, Romanticism, Japonisme, and Neoclassicism, to name the most prominent. Conserved by their owners as collectible from the start, they were often re-purposed as storage receptacles, defying their ephemeral nature. This course will examine the social and cultural history of these tins, comprising the emergence of tea as a meal where biscuits were consumed in Victorian Britian, the development of the techniques of chromolithographic printing on tinplate, the refinement of the various cookie recipes, the role of sugar and the colonial project, the evolution of advertising and marketing strategies, and the diffusion of the tins around the world. While the focus of the BGC exhibition on Biscuit Tins, scheduled for Spring 2026, will be a group of British tins in the BGC Study Collection, research topics can include French and American tins, the pre-history of biscuit tins in other media such as ceramic and precious metals, and the visual media such as advertising copy, catalogues, and posters that accompanied their distribution. Students will select a group of tins from the BGC collection to study and will write up a series of catalogue essays for inclusion in a digital publication. Course requirements include a midterm presentation and the completion of four to five essays of c. 500 words, to be determined in consultation with the instructors. 3 credits. MDP.