There are two types of silver-plate tea sets and coffee pots. The first are made of Sheffield silver, which describes an English plating technique developed in the 1740s, in which a sheet of sterling silver was fused to a sheet of copper, creating a strong, bi-metal sandwich that could be formed and chased like sterling silver. About 100 years later, also in England, electroplating was introduced. It required even less silver, which meant silver-plate tea sets and the like could be marketed to the country’s emerging middle class.
