Melissa Johnson is the mind behind Miss Havisham's Curiosities — and the woman responsible for teaching porcelain how to swear.

She is descended from antique dealers, grew up at flea markets, and some say was even born at a garage sale. The insult teacup itself isn't a marketing gimmick — it's inherited rage. The idea came from her grandmother's own insult teacups and bitter quilts, and Melissa simply gave the family tradition a proper kiln-fired revival, which is why every piece here is still hand-insulted one wicked bon mot at a time.

That revival has been featured on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, in And Just Like That, and in Forbes, Bust Magazine, and Boing Boing, and has led to official collaborations with Dita Von Teese and Elvira, Mistress of the Dark.

Before any of that, Melissa developed and produced television for clients including The Colbert Report, The Disney Channel, Playhouse Disney, PBS, Nickelodeon, MTV, VH1, Comedy Central, Cartoon Network, A&E, Oxygen Media, BET, and Robert Smigel's TV Funhouse/Saturday Night Live.

She's currently at work on a book-length memoir, which she hopes lands somewhere between Running With Scissors and Grey Gardens — but, you know, with Arabs in Ohio.

Melissa's a horror movie fanatic, a junk scavenger, and a lover of all things weird, creepy, and haunted. She's married to puppeteer and director Tim Lagasse. They live in Los Angeles now (but miss New York), and together they travel, collect junk, and train their ever-growing cat circus.