Set of Three French Bistro Porcelain Price Saucers

Before digital tills and printed receipts, the French café ran on a beautifully simple system: a small porcelain saucer placed before each customer, printed with the price of whatever they had ordered. A coffee, a glass of wine, an apéritif — each had its saucer. As the orders mounted, the waiter stacked them, and the total was right there in the pile. When the bill was settled, the same saucers received the change and the tip.

These three saucers, from Patricia and Walter Wells's Paris apartment, are a charming survival of that system. Each is made of white porcelain with a raised central well and decorated with a simple coloured band around the rim: one in terracotta-orange, one in soft celadon green, one in green with accents of gold. The prices are printed in bold black numerals in French franc notation — *2f50*, *2f75*, and a third whose amount is just legible. The typography is crisp and graphic, the kind of functional lettering that has aged into something genuinely appealing. Saucers like these were produced by various manufacturers, often from Limoges or Pillivuyt, and customised to each establishment, which accounts for the variation in rim colour and decoration even within a single set.

Grouped together on a shelf, windowsill or kitchen dresser, these three make an understated and witty display — a small piece of French social history that also happens to be very good to look at.