Greetings from The World’s Largest Teapot in lovely Chester, West Virginia!!

The Teapot started off life as a root beer barrel, but was soon transformed into a teapot to celebrate the pottery-making heritage of the area. It’s been moved around quite a bit and has spent periods of its life as a souvenir stand and hot-dog shop. It was abandoned and threatened for some time but has since been completely restored and sits just off the interstate for those not willing to drive very far to see something kitschy. The restoration was sponsored by Hampton Hotels, but I’m sorry to say you can’t sleep in a teapot. The area still produces a lot of pottery, Fiestaware probably being the most notable, however Chester’s biggest moneymaker at a moment is the Casino down the road.

Here’s an old postcard from it’s souvenir stand days.

I happened to be in town the day they repainted the teapot and replaced it’s roof and lid-handle. :) The thing used to be surrounded by an ugly chain-link fence that made photographing it and standing next to it impossible, but thankfully they have removed it and replaced it with a nicer fence and allow access to it again, though you have to cross a major road to get to it and try not to get run over.

Here it is in beautiful repainted glory! They added a good ‘ol USA flag, because what’s more American then a “world’s largest” anything? :)