I knew you would have some good ideas Lux. The sculpt would work pretty good. In fact may be able to add some of that detail in with booleans.  I 'm thinking of using some curves with a bevel and taper applied. Convert them to mesh once you got them positioned and then boolean them in.  I know booleans make some crappy looking topology but I was thinking of blending and smothing in dyntopo sculpt mode. Then give it the old retopology. Thanks for the idea.

That's a good idea.  Also, as long as this isn't an object which would see deformation in some way for animation, you could add those scalloped details as a kind of  floating geometry.  For instance, use retopo tools to paint some polygons along the surface of the modeled teapot as separate elements laying on the surface, then thicken it, and subdivide it smooth.   Since the details will be attached to the object as elements, no one will ever notice it's not part of the original base mesh. For example, I did this exact technique to create the scalloped-style feet on this piano stool model, as well as the ornamental work on the base.

http://www.renderosity.com/mod/freestuff/?item_id=73227

Again, as long as the model isn't required to animate in any way which would cause the surface deformation, or require the entire thing to be solid for something like 3D printing, then floating geo is often a great way to present details like this.  Retopology tools are also a great way to create those details directly on the surface.

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