Pattern 374 Spode bone china Bute shape Trio with simple gilt decoration produced by Josiah Spode II c1802, the trio includes a Tea Cup, a Coffee Can & Saucer. This trio show-cases Josiah Spode II's wonderfully white porcelain & the quality of his gilders' craftsmanship. During this period only one saucer per tea cup & coffee can was included in a service as tea & coffee were not generally served at the same time.
The scallop shaped gilt border design was known in the Spode pattern books as 'French edge' and was commonly known to all English porcelain manufacturers as 'Dontil Edge' presumably derived from the French word for denticulated which is 'dentele'.
This is a surprisingly modern design but actually coffee cans of this shape were produced by Minton at the very end of the 18th century and when Josiah Spode II introduced his London shape coffee cup in 1813 the can shape quickly disappeared from fashion and didn't reappear until the early 20th century period nearly one hundred years later.
So English coffee cans of c1795-1820 were in a limited period of production and are quite rare & Spode's can designs were only produced from c1799-c1820 (apart from subsequent reproductions which were produced during both the Copeland & Garrett period & Copeland periods).