Topic: Holmegaard labels - Is there a list of items to match the number on the labels?

[ahremck]

Does anyone know of a listing that connects the number shown on the label(see below) with the item it is stuck on?

Ross

[Pinkspoons]

First number is the year quarter, last numbers are the year. So your label should have been used on glass produced in the fourth quarter - October-December - of 1986.

During the 70s the year number was represented by a single digit, so '46' would represent the same period of 1976.

I'm not sure how reliable this is as a means of dating an item, though, as the labels are easy to remove and stick on to other pieces, and the factory themselves may not have been too strict with keeping labels current. I've had plenty of items with completely the wrong decade on the labels, never mind the wrong quarter.

[HarderNet.dk]

Does anyone know of a listing that connects the number shown on the label(see below) with the item it is stuck on?

Ross

Hej Ross.

You can find information to label and signature on my website, examples is placed under designer link at the end of each page, try designer link Holmegaard and after danish description there is a link for jump to signature examples.
Similar signature examples can be found on other designer pages.

[ahremck]

Peter the problem is not the label or signature it is the number on the label - 486 in the example I gave.  Pinkspoons explanation may not be quite right since the photos attached show a 51 and as far as I know a fifth quarter is impossible.  Do you know a way of identifying the date, or designer, or what the piece is, just from the number.  The 486 is in fact a Sakura vase by Michael Bang.  The 51 comes from a small bowl by Kylle Svanlund.

Ross

[HarderNet.dk]

Peter the problem is not the label or signature it is the number on the label - 486 in the example I gave.  Pinkspoons explanation may not be quite right since the photos attached show a 51 and as far as I know a fifth quarter is impossible.  Do you know a way of identifying the date, or designer, or what the piece is, just from the number.  The 486 is in fact a Sakura vase by Michael Bang.  The 51 comes from a small bowl by Kylle Svanlund.

Ross

From the labels you can only make out the production time for the specific item in hand, nothing else. The three digit number labels do seems to start i 1981 before that two digit labels were in use and I am working with the possibility that the label 69 will be production year 1976 in the September month, but I have not enough reference labels yet to match up against design year. This 2 digit label do seems only to have been used in the 1970s.

Have over the year seen wrong engraved signatures to items, almost just as many as misplaced labels to item, so it is not always easy to put the right design time on an item.

It is a rely fine "Jydepotte" you have there design by Kylle Svanlund, 1973 quit rare I think.

[ahremck]

Thanks for the prompt response Peter.  I have a couple of new Holmegaard bits - not yet photographed on of which I think is also labelled with 51.  They are both Lutken designs I suspect but not signed.  One seems to be a large "Provence/Arne skål" in a pale Aqua Blue.  The other is like a large bowl but was described as a large ice bucket.  It has a small pouring lip on the rim.  It too is Aqua blue but I can't seem to find a reference either on your site or the Museum site.  I will email you direct.

Ross

[Pinkspoons]

The Selskab museum site also references the quarterly number reference here:

http://www.glashistoriskselskab.dk/index.php/Glashistorisk-Museum/Holmegaard-designet-glas/Signaturer/Label-487-2773

It's possible that there are exceptions or mistakes within the printed label system.

[HarderNet.dk]

Thanks for the prompt response Peter.  I have a couple of new Holmegaard bits - not yet photographed on of which I think is also labelled with 51.  They are both Lutken designs I suspect but not signed.  One seems to be a large "Provence/Arne skål" in a pale Aqua Blue.  The other is like a large bowl but was described as a large ice bucket.  It has a small pouring lip on the rim.  It too is Aqua blue but I can't seem to find a reference either on your site or the Museum site.  I will email you direct.

Ross

I will take a look at your items.

As for labels there is of cause a small problem with 10, 11 and the 12 month in the 2 digit label numbers, and therefore I am also working with the possibility that the 2 digit label number in the 1970s was referring to a production line or a workers employment number, to have a way to track what production line had most 2. factory or return glass and then a possibility to set in with skills training.

I do seems that the first digit can represent a year, none of the labels I have collected so fare give a production year before the design year and not a production year after a line has gone out of production. Do I reverse it so last digit is the year I get several production year before the item has been designed.

Have some examples on labels without any number as well.

[Pinkspoons]

Production number was my first thought when trying to figure out the numbers on the labels, but I bowed to the knowledge of the Selskab group, as they've people a lot better versed in the past running of the factory.

But some of the earlier labels (Kastrup-Holmegaard and before) have similar numbering systems on them and these don't seem to refer to year codes.

This label could, plausibly, be a year code - '42' - it's from an early boxed set of 1962 'Skotland' glasses:

(http://www.holmegaardresource.com/images/label_15.gif)

But this one is marked '01' - and there's definitely no zero month or zero quarter 

(http://www.holmegaardresource.com/images/label_4.gif)

[Pinkspoons]

One of my 'anomalies' is this 'Trigona' bowl, designed 1990, which was owned by a friend from new (so no label tampering had taken place)...