Celery vase

Celery is less than £1 in the supermarket, but it used to be a luxury food that only the very rich could afford. Just like pineapples in the decades previously, it was laborious and expensive to produce, so in the mid 19th century fashionable hosts displayed celery in vases at the centre of the table.

Celery vases look a lot like any other vase, but you can spot one because they’re usually glass (better for showing-off purposes), flared at the top, and with a separate footed base. They’re also around a standard 23cm tall – the perfect height for exhibiting your beautiful celery stalks. 

There are some lovely vases engraved with couples’ initials and the date of their wedding, and I personally like the ones that say ‘celery’ – as if the centrepiece needed explaining. Very rarely, celery vases make upwards of £1,000 at auction. Run-of-the-mill examples go for as little as £5.

If displaying celery isn’t your thing, I think they make great, and very inexpensive, candle lanterns.