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Imperial Off Hand Glass ca. 1923-24

The Imperial Free Hand line was the realization of a long time desire of Victor G. Wicke, the head of Imperial, to create world glass European style art glass. Wicke assembled a team of mostly European craftsmen whose sole interest was creating art for art's sake. Among the men to work on this line was the well known Swedish born gaffer, Emil Larsen. The glass was expensive to produce was high priced for the times. It was not well received by the public and production lasted just a little over a year ceasing in 1924. Leftover stock from this line, that is now very sought after by collectors, was sold off for $1 per barrel in the 1930s.