Whether it’s a favorite wooden spoon, an inherited salt shaker, or a vintage corkscrew collection, Bee Wilson explores why stuff matters to us.
Anyone who has cleared house after the death of a loved one or watched even one episode of The Repair Shop can understand how objects connect us to memories.
“People are there in our lives and then they are not. But objects remain.” For the food writer, Bee Wilson, when a heart-shaped baking tin clatters to the floor, she is reminded of what was and what can no longer be. That realization made her search for similar stories. Her book, The Heart-Shaped Tin: Love, Loss, and Kitchen Objects, explores everyday kitchen objects across continents, cultures, and centuries – from crafting a tin spoon as an act of defiance during World War II to understanding that life is too short to save the “best china” for special occasions. “There is more than one way of demonstrating that an object is special…use it as much as possible [or] lock it away in a cabinet or cupboard…for fear of damaging it or reducing its value.” Part memoir and part essay, Wilson tracks her own loss and recovery, while using meticulous research to support the deep meaning found in kitchen objects, even for a queen. In the national art museum in Siena, Italy (Pinacoteca Nazionale di Siena), there is a portrait of Queen Elizabeth I who ruled England from 1558 to 1603. 
Queen Elizabeth I - The Siena Portrait.
In the portrait, rather than holding a sceptre or an orb, the Queen is holding a kitchen sieve – her favorite heraldic device and a symbol of wisdom (because a sieve sorts wanted items from unwanted ones).
Known as The Siena Portrait (one of several paintings like it), the portrait demonstrates “…there is a subtlety to the way she wields her power.” In The Heart-Shaped Tin, Wilson proves again and again how humble kitchen objects can wield power over us all by weaving her personal narrative with stories from others who have an emotional connection to a beloved kitchen object. “The great unspoken truth of objects is that we can invest our own uses and meanings for them.” In the end, the heart-shaped tin becomes a reminder of the power of new beginnings.
Bee Wilson is a cook and food writer who writes about food as it relates to other aspects of life. She has written for The Guardian, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and The London Review of Books. She co-founded the charity TastEd aimed at bringing the joy of fruit and vegetables to children in schools and nurseries in the United Kingdom.
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