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Author Topic: Ravenhead Glass, Help needed!  (Read 17405 times)

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Offline NazeingResearch

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Ravenhead Glass, Help needed!
« on: June 21, 2007, 11:00:15 AM »
Hello there, I'm new to the forum and have been trying to find as much information on Ravenhead glass as I possibly can. I was hoping someone here would be able to fill in the gaps; for such a large company there seems to be very little information about them.

What I have found so far (if any of this is incorrect please let me know!) Its the beginings of the company I am having a really hard time establishing and names, designers associated with Ravenhead.

1901: Ravenhead was bought out by Pilkingtons

1948: UNited Glass installed a new machine, the Westlake, made by Oewns-Illinois. The firm was now capable of producing huge amounts of glasses fully automatically. @Worthington', 'Paris' & 'Waterloo' designs first to be produced this way.

1964: United Glass closes Sherdley plant, all production moved to Ravenhead

1977: Company sales amount to £15 million

1987: United Glass/Ravenhead sold to Maerican Bottlemaker Libby

2000: Ravenhead sold to Durobor, owned by Belgian Regional Government of Wallonne Brabant

2001: 300 Jobs lost when firm closed in March, after falling into financial dificulties

2003: Rayware bought factory site and the Ravenhead name, continued to produce Ravenhead glass


Any help would be greatly appreciated! Anything left over will hopefully be revealed in Sheffield
Rob @ Nazeing Glass

Offline Ivo

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Re: Ravenhead Glass, Help needed!
« Reply #1 on: June 21, 2007, 11:50:34 AM »
check out a copy of Lesley Jackson's "20th Century Factory Glass" - it has a three page article on Ravenhead.

Offline Max

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Re: Ravenhead Glass, Help needed!
« Reply #2 on: June 21, 2007, 11:59:46 AM »
...also Andy McConnell's book '20th Century Glass' has an interesting 6 page article on Hardie Williamson you might enjoy.

I am not a man

Offline NazeingResearch

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Re: Ravenhead Glass, Help needed!
« Reply #3 on: June 21, 2007, 01:29:20 PM »
Cheers for the tips. I have a copy of 20th Century Glass, but it doesnt tell you anyhting about Ravenhead's early history. Luckily they have a copy of 20th century factory glass in a couple of libraries so I'll get that one out. THanks for your help
Rob @ Nazeing Glass

Offline David E

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Re: Ravenhead Glass, Help needed!
« Reply #4 on: June 21, 2007, 02:39:44 PM »
You might also be interested to learn that Heidi is currently researching United Glass (Sherdley/Ravenhead) with a view to publishing a book at some point. We have also 'started' a web site (started = it has a menu! ;D) which is at:

www.sherdley-ravenhead.com

Naturally, any input would be most welcome. The dates look right to me, but I'll alert Heidi to this thread who has far more experience than me.

Designers of screen-printed designs from c.1955-1980 are Alexander Hardie Williamson, Annette Meech and John Clappison. We also have a forum for Slumped and Transfer printed gl;ass that you might like to explore for further information:

http://www.glassmessages.com/index.php/board,12.0.html
David
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Offline David E

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Re: Ravenhead Glass, Help needed!
« Reply #5 on: June 21, 2007, 02:42:17 PM »
Just out of curiosity, is there any reason for using the ID 'NazeingResearch'?

The reason I ask is because the Nazeing MD, Stephen Pollock-Hill, does frequent this board.
David
► Chance Additions ◄
The 2nd volume of the domestic glassware of Chance Brothers
Contact ► Cortex Design ◄ to order any book

Offline NazeingResearch

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Re: Ravenhead Glass, Help needed!
« Reply #6 on: June 21, 2007, 03:00:33 PM »
You might also be interested to learn that Heidi is currently researching United Glass (Sherdley/Ravenhead) with a view to publishing a book at some point. We have also 'started' a web site (started = it has a menu! ;D) which is at:

www.sherdley-ravenhead.com

Naturally, any input would be most welcome. The dates look right to me, but I'll alert Heidi to this thread who has far more experience than me.

Designers of screen-printed designs from c.1955-1980 are Alexander Hardie Williamson, Annette Meech and John Clappison. We also have a forum for Slumped and Transfer printed gl;ass that you might like to explore for further information:

http://www.glassmessages.com/index.php/board,12.0.html

I spent about 10 minutes yesterday looking through the source file on that site trying to find the pages thinking they were just broken links! Haha. Will post again when I find out more, and probabaly pick your brains at some stage too. Cheers for the help (and the pointer not to try the website again until its finished, doh)
Rob @ Nazeing Glass

Offline Heidimin

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Re: Ravenhead Glass, Help needed!
« Reply #7 on: June 21, 2007, 07:40:43 PM »
Hi, NazeingResearch.

As David says, I've been delving into the history of United Glass/ Sherdley/ Ravenhead. My interest started with the screen-printed tumblers designed for Sherdley and then Ravenhead by Alexander Hardie Williamson. You can see my ever-expanding collection in the Glass Gallery at http://glassgallery.yobunny.org.uk/thumbnails.php?album=254.

The company history is incredibly complex, but the following is my current best understanding:

1913 - six bottle manufacturers in and around St Helens (Nuttall & Co, Alfred Alexander & Co Ltd, E Brefflit, Robert Candlish, Cannington Shaw, and Moore & Nettlefield) merge to create    United Glass Bottle Manufacturers Limited. The merger enables the six factories to pool resources to purchase new automatic bottle-making machinery from the US    glass manufacturer Owens-Illinois.

1932 - UGB installs new American automatic tableware machines, two pressing machines and a machine for making thin blown tumblers, at the former Cannington Shaw site in Sherdley. Begins making tableware under the trademark Sherdley Ware.

1948 - UGB installs Westlake machine, made by Libbey division of US bottle-maker Owens-Illinois, fully automating production of stemware at Ravenhead.

1959 - UGB renamed United Glass. Producing a third of all container glass made in the UK.

1964 - Sherdley works closed. Tableware production moves to Ravenhead factory; bottle production to new factory at adjacent Peasley site.

1987 - United Glass bought by Owens-Illinois. Ravenhead becomes part of Libbey St Clair, a Canadian branch of Libbey Glass.

1990 - Ravenhead factory sold to Rand & Simoni.

1992 - Ravenhead acquired by Bankers Trust and then bought by Belgian glassmakers Durobor.

late 1990s - Ravenhead the largest manufacturer of table glass in the UK, employing about 1,100 people, exporting to over 100 countries, and producing up to 100 million glasses a year.

1999 - Ravenhead goes into administration.

2000 - Ravenhead brand acquired by the Rayware Group.

2001 - Ravenhead factory closes, making 300 staff redundant. Most are over 50 and are told that they will receive only statutory redundancy pay, and that they will have their pensions reduced    by about 20 per cent, as the pension scheme contained a £5 million black hole. Machinery shipped to Zhuhai on the south China coast.

2003 - Rayware Group announce purchase of the former Ravenhead site, which it intends to use to revitalise the Ravenhead brand, re-branding pint pots and other traditional glasses with the Ravenhead name. It hopes to create 200 new jobs at the site.

2007 - Rayware marketing glasses, ovenware and vacuum flasks under the Ravenhead brand.

I have some information about the firms which combined to form UGB, but nothing like a complete picture. I think the connection with Pilkingtons is rather earlier than your information suggests: in 1872,   Nuttall & Co sold their factory at Ravenhead to Pilkington Brothers and transferred production to a new factory with gas-fired furnaces on a thirteen acre site at Ravenhead.

The United Glass container operation continues to this day as a subsidiary of Owens-Illinois. The United Glass name was kept until 2005, when it changed to O-I as part of a global re-branding of Owens-Illinois. The Peasley Cross factory in St Helens closed in 1999 and production concentrated at Alloa, Scotland and Harlow, Essex.
 
As David says, the principal designer associated with Sherdley/ Ravenhead is Alexander Hardie Williamson, who worked for them from 1944 until his retirement in 1974. Thereafter, designers included John Clappison (best known as a ceramicist working for Hornsea Pottery and later Royal Doulton), who worked for Ravenhead from 1972 to 1976; Annette Meech, still working as a studio glassmaker, who worked for Ravenhead from 1972 to 1983; and David Queensbury of the Queensbury Hunt design partnership, who was head of ceramics at the Royal College of Art.

There is, as you say, very little published material on Sherdley/ Ravenhead. In addition to the books mentioned by Max and Ivo, there is some more information about AHW's work in a leaflet produced by Broadfield House Glass Museum to accompany their 1996 exhibition Slim Jims and Tubbies. There is also a chapter on Sherdley/ Ravenhead in British Table and Ornamental Glass, L M Angus-Butterworth, 1956. John Clappison's designs for Ravenhead are covered in a new biography by Pauline Coyle: http://www.hornsea-pottery.co.uk . If you've found other sources, I'd be very interested to hear about them.

Hope this helps - and apologies for the length of this posting!

Heidi

Offline Heidimin

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Re: Ravenhead Glass, Help needed!
« Reply #8 on: June 21, 2007, 09:38:21 PM »
Quote
Anything left over will hopefully be revealed in Sheffield

 ???
Heidi

Offline NazeingResearch

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Re: Ravenhead Glass, Help needed!
« Reply #9 on: June 22, 2007, 08:12:36 AM »
Just out of curiosity, is there any reason for using the ID 'NazeingResearch'?

The reason I ask is because the Nazeing MD, Stephen Pollock-Hill, does frequent this board.

Better keep myself in check then, thats my boss! Im working at Nazeing doing research for the soon to be opened glass museum. I am surrounded by books, piled high on my desk, and I have access to registration records of most county's in Britain, but it still isnt enough sometimes, as with Ravenhead. Obviously I need more books at my side, which thanks to the help I received here are on their way as we speak
Rob @ Nazeing Glass

 

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