The birdcage vases would have been considered very extravagant and luxurious oriental wares, which were exported to Europe in the early eighteenth century. A large group of 20 of these vases were purchased by Augustus II the Strong - Elector of Saxony and king of Poland (1670-1733), for his display in the Japanese Palais in Dresden (1729-1737). The palace was re-designed to house his extravagant collection of 28,000 of oriental porcelain on the ground floor and his own Meissen porcelain on the first floor. Sadly the project was not finished in his lifetime, but designs and inventories of 1721 attest to the grand plans. Considering the Japanese policy on foreign trade, these Japanese birdcage vases could only have been imported by the Dutch East-India Company (VOC) and traded from the Netherlands. Fifty replica birdcage vases were commissioned from the Meissen Manufactory around 1730. However, it would seem that Meissen Manufactory was unable to fulfil this order and only supplied a very limited number of these objects.

We currently know of 23 birdcage vases, nine of which are in the current Royal Porcelain Collection in Dresden. Château de Pau has three in its collection, which were confiscated during the revolution from the Princes de Condé. The Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam has two, the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford has one, as does the Peabody Essex Museum, Salem. A Japanese Private collection – exhibited in the Kyushu Museum, Arita - is slightly smaller than the other extant vases. Four vases from the Dresden Collection were restituted to the deposed Wettin family and are now in a private collection. These vases rarely come onto the market, so it is extremely unusual to find a pair.