Largest collection of tea towels

The largest collection of tea towels is 1,457, achieved by Barbara Howard (UK), in Nottingham, UK, on 12 November 2021.

Barbara has been collecting tea towels for over 50 years. When she retired in 2015, she began a project to categorise all of her items and opened a blog in which she tells the story of every tea towel she owns.

She does not have a favourite item, however her favourite designer is the late Pat Albeck who designed more than 300 tea towels for the National Trust and National Trust for Scotland. Barbara's most treasured item in the collection is a "Have a Happy Christmas" tea towel she bought for her mother in 1962. Her first item was "The Welsh Language" which she bought at Swansea University.

Barbara has met a handful of other tea towel collectors but has so far not come across anybody with a collection close to the size of hers.

She uses all the tea towels in rotation. "Tea towels, in my view, are a fine example of 'Domestic Art', for every day usage", she told GWR.

On becoming a Guinness World Records title holder, she said: "I am very proud of my collection and see it as a social history because of the stories behind each tea towel, whether they be ones I have bought or those I have inherited. Achieving a Guinness World Records title would validate the collection, the time and effort it takes to add to, store, catalogue and write up blogs about each tea towel. My (step) grandchildren are incredibly excited about the possibility of me holding a title and have infused in me the importance of the next generation's interest in collections, however quirky they may be. I hope to inspire other people to begin collections, or expand their collections."