The Lithuanian Presidential Office has ordered a custom-made set of tableware to serve dinner to NATO summit guests.
The first day of the NATO summit, hosted in Vilnius on July 11-23, culminates with a reception at the Presidential Palace hosted by President Gitanas Nausėda. Around 80 people will attend the reception in the White Hall of the Presidential Palace, which will be catered by the team of the Monai restaurant. The team will be headed by Chef Vytautas Samavičius. He says that he will try to show the guests the richness of Lithuanian food and cuisine.
The eighty dinner guests will be served their dinner, tea and coffee from new porcelain dishes. These top-class tableware items were made specifically for the summit, but will continue to be used at the Presidential Palace for all future receptions for foreign leaders.
Dalia Radvilavičiūtė, the head of Kauno Jiesia, the company that produced the tableware, has told LRT TV that this was one of the largest orders in the company’s history.
The President’s Office ordered 480 large and 120 smaller plates, 120 coffee cups and 30 tea cups with saucers. The crockery, made of bone china, is extremely light, especially the cups, which have very thin walls. According to Radvilavičiūtė, tea and coffee taste different from these cups.
All the tableware are decorated with the presidential coat of arms and a gold ribbon made of 12-percent gold. Each item has an inscription noting it was made for the president of Lithuania. If any is broken, the company would be able to produce replacements for the missing pieces.
Radvilavičiūtė says the company has already received enquiries from potential buyers looking to purchase identical sets. However, she says, that will not be possible: “This is a special shape for foreign guests.”
Radvilavičiūtė also said that before the cups were produced, several samples were made and refined until they met the requirements of the protocol and the buyer’s needs.
Newsletter
Every Friday morning.
