Topic: Holmegaard - Mistaken Identity...

[alexander]

The gull thing...

I took another look at the first "gull" vase in this thread - the one with a bird decoration.

The Norwegian artisan collective Plus Fredrikstad produced decanters and vases with a gull, as in seagull, type decoration.
The color of the mentioned piece doesn't ring a bell. They did pieces in similar shapes.
The seagull is very similar to a piece I have. Most of my colletion is in chaos at the moment
as I had to move it for some electrical work on the house so it took a while to check.

Seagull Decorated Small Decanter

All Plus glass, with the exeption of som popular ashtrays, was signed in some way.
Their glass is quite popular here commanding good prices, some of norway's finest
glass artists put in time there at one time or another. All designs were approved by an artists comittee.

The Holmegaard "gulvase" name while similar to "gull" means something completely different.
If a scandinavian (norwegian, swedish or danish) uses the word "gull" that means gold, "gul" means yellow and
"gulv" means floor.
What the "gul" in "gulvase" means I'm not to clear on but it could be wordplay on "gulv vase"
which would be "floor vase".

[Pinkspoons]

The decoration on the purple vase in the auction is more of a palm motif than an avian design - the auction just shows the vase poorly (probably on purpose). The seller is only throwing 'gull' in there because they're dishonestly trying to pass it off as a Gulvase to amateur collectors, but are too ignorant to get it right. I've seen these vases up close in junk shops, and they're really nasty, badly made things.

I do like the colour of your decanter, though - I've always been a sucker for more subtle palettes.