Limoges Tea Cups, France, mid-20th century
I found this pair of Limoges porcelain tea cups with matching saucers at an antiques market in Arezzo during the summer of 2020, only a few weeks before moving to Paris. Delicately finished with hand-applied gilded rims and handles, they immediately reminded me of my mother's white dinnerware with its fine golden edges—a quiet image from childhood that had stayed with me for years. I imagined beginning my mornings with them, turning an ordinary breakfast into a small daily ritual.
Growing up in Brazil and later building my life in Europe, I inherited very few domestic objects. These cups became meaningful because they represented something different: the beginning of an inheritance I was creating for myself. Rather than receiving family heirlooms, I slowly assembled my own archive through objects chosen with care, each one carrying the memory of a place, a season, or a personal transformation. These tea cups mark that beginning. They remind me that a home is not only inherited—it can also be patiently composed, object by object, until it becomes a portrait of one's own life.