Tallinn Zoo gardener collects porcelain tea sets, plans museum near Lake Peipus

In the village of Lohusuu near Lake Peipus stands a farmhouse whose owner spends his free time on an unusual hobby: collecting porcelain. Dmitri Pshenichny works as a gardener at Tallinn Zoo on weekdays, but at home hundreds of porcelain pieces await him.

His passion began in childhood, when he inherited a porcelain figurine of a footballer from his grandmother. Over time more figurines followed, bought at markets, then vases, and eventually the collection grew to include tableware and full tea sets.

From apartment to farmhouse

While the collection was kept in an ordinary apartment, space quickly ran out. The situation changed six years ago when Pshenichny bought a farmhouse called Sillaotsa talu, built in 1947 and later used as a summer house. Now nearly every room — including the entryway, where items are even stored in banana boxes — is filled with porcelain: soup tureens, teapots (including pieces made by the Kuznetsov factory), and more.

The collection also includes rarer items whose purpose isn't obvious to everyone today, such as a jam-serving set recently given to him by friends who themselves didn't know what it was for.

Sets meant to be used, not just stored

During Soviet times, owning a fine tea set was a mark of status, which meant many sets were never actually used and simply sat on shelves. Pshenichny now tries to put such unused sets to their intended purpose — for instance, laying a full table setting for a birthday and serving a multi-course meal on matching dishware.

He holds a particular fondness for porcelain made in Riga, though his collection includes pieces from elsewhere as well. With more than 150 tea sets already gathered, Pshenichny plans to convert a former barn on the property, once used to house horses and pigs, into an exhibition hall. If all goes according to plan, a porcelain museum could open in Lohusuu as early as next year.