The museum grew from the personal teapot collection of owner Sue Blazye, which started when her grandmother gave her a teapot in 1983, encouraging other family members and friends to do the same.

[1] The growth of her collection eventually led to her needing a larger space to house it, and she established Teapot Island in Yalding, in November 2002.

[1] The building used for the collection used to be a cafe called the Riverside Diner, which had been in operation since the 1950s.

[1] The museum lost this title in 2011, when it was awarded to a man in China with a collection of 30,000.

[5] In 2011, the museum was featured in the book Crap Days Out, in which the authors stated: "It's awful if you don't like teapots.