Antique and Vintage Glassware

Antique and vintage glassware encompasses countless types of decorative-yet-functional containers, bowls, and platters produced from the late 1800s through the mid-1900s. While some collectors of antique glass purchase these delicate objects for display purposes only, others buy vintage glassware to use for cooking and serving. Popular examples of antique and vintage glassware include pressed glass, cut glass, carnival glass, Depression glass, elegant glass, and milk glass. Of these techniques, cut glass is the oldest, going back some 2,000 years, almost to the introduction in the West of glassblowing itself. Then, as now, glass was cut by holding a cooled piece up to a grinding wheel to carve grooves in its side. The effect could be used to produce decorations, designs, and patterns in the surface of antique glass. Another type of cut glass could also be called carved glass. In the earliest surviving example of this technique, a piece of 1st-century cameo glass known as the Portland Vase, a top layer of white glass has been carved away to reveal the background of dark blue glass behind it. During the so-called "American Brilliant" period from the late 19th century until the early part of the 20th, intricately cut pieces of leaded crystal on a dining table was a key signifier of social status and class. But the American Brilliant era was brief, its optical opulence interrupted by World War I and dealt a final blow during the Depression, when less-expensive pressed glass was embraced by budget-conscious consumers. In the United States, the production of pressed glass proliferated in the mid-1800s, when the Early American Pattern Glass (or EAPG) industry matured. Manufacturers such as New England Glass Company of Cambridge, Massachusetts, and Cambridge Glass Company of Cambridge, Ohio, were leaders, as was McKee of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. These companies and many others like them, often produced the same patterns (albeit with very minor differences to avoid lawsuits), with names like Bellflower, Wildflower, Westward-Ho, Lion, Thousand Eye, and Three Face. The numerous firms that came out of Ohio were particularly strong, including Heisey, Fostoria, and Jennette. The roots of Indiana Glass Company, one of the biggest manufacturers of glassware in the United States, goes back to the tail end of the 19th century, when the Beatty-Brady Glass Company of Dunkirk, Indiana, produced everything from carnival glass to tumblers, goblets, and plates. Soon the company that would be known by the name of its home state was making everything from utilitarian glassware for the kitchen decorated with horseshoes to lines influenced by Art Deco. Indiana did Vaseline glass, as well as a pattern called Avocado that many glass historians consider the first example of Depression glass. In addition, Indiana was one of many manufacturers of dishes whose covers were shaped like hens. During the 1920s, many pressed-glass manufacturers struggled as cut glass from France (Baccarat) and Ireland (Waterford) became relatively cheap. But the stock-market crash of 1929 gave a boost to even less-expensive forms of pressed glass, known, fittingly, as Depression glass. Now it was Anchor-Hocking’s turn to shine. Also from Ohio, the firm manufactured at an impressive rate, producing 90 pieces of clear and colored glassware a minute, allowing it to practically give away Circle, Mayfair, Spiral, and other popular glassware patterns for pennies each. Concurrently, companies such as Fenton and Northwood were cranking out a sort of poor-man’s Tiffany Favrile known as carnival glass, since it was so often given away as prizes at carnivals. Fenton made roughly 150 patterns of carnival, with descriptive names like Waterlily and Cattails, Peacock Tail, Thistle, and Wreath of Roses. Because the competition was so fierce, companies resorted to all sorts of visual gimmicks to distinguish themselves. One by-product of this race to the bottom was the aforementioned Vaseline or uranium glass, which glowed green when exposed to UV light thanks to its sprayed coating of uranium salt on its surface. Though common at the time, and generally not rare today, carnival glass has become a particularly vibrant collectible for those who love glass and glassware. Of the companies that specialized in clear and opaque colored glass, Hazel-Atlas is a favorite of many collectors. Originally founded in 1885 to produce glass liners for the caps of Mason jars, by 1902 Hazel-Atlas was one of the leading manufacturers of fruit jars, oil bottles, lamp bases, and commercial glass containers, perhaps most famously for Milk of Magnesia, whose blue color and rectangular shape are easy to spot when digging for bottles or looking for them at yard sales. More recently, during the second half of the 20th century, a high-tech form of glass called Pyrex elbowed its way into American kitchens. Developed in 1915 by Corning Glass Works, Pyrex debuted as a line of clear-glass ovenware, but most glassware collectors are happy to own the colorful, vintage Pyrex produced from 1947 until the late 1960s. Not only is the glass stronger than its pre-World War II formulation, it’s undeniably cooler, thanks to its Mid-Century Modern shapes, decorations, and colors.