The motif of this 1997 Desirée annual cup WITHOUT saucer from The Porcelain Factory Desiree, also known as Désirée Denmark, Svend Jensen of Denmark, Old Copenhagen Blue is found in the Hans Christian Andersen autobiography The Fairy Tale of My Life. The 1997 Hans Christian Andersen Annual Cup had the same motif as the 1997 Svend Jensen Christmas plate. So the 1997 Desiree Annual Cup and the 1997 Desiree Christmas plate are actaully a beautiful coffee set with plate and cup. In his autobiography Hans Christian Andersen writes about his stay at the Wulff family who were living in one of the Royal Palaces at Amalienborg Palace. Hans Christian Andersen wrote how he was standing by the window looking down to the palace square. The artist, Lis Torbol, has probably been thinking of this when she designed the Annual cup of this year. On the Annual cup you see The Amalienborg Palace Square with the guardsman and The Equestrian Statue of King Frederik V. King Frederik V founded "Frederiksstaden" in which Amalienborg Palace is the centre. It was founded in 1749 to mark that the House of Oldenburg took over the Danish throne 300 years ago. Some of the soil in "Frederiksstaden" was given to noble families conditioned that they had to build palaces on them. Désirée started the Annual cup series in 1982 and ended it in 2001. So 20 different sets were made to complete a perfect coffee set. All motifs of the Hans Christian Andersen annual cups from Désirée are inspired by Hans Christian Andersen´s Fairy Tales.