Clear glass is suitable for windows and scientific work (and there is some truly amazing and beautiful lab glassware out there), but as far as art is concerned - it is a medium in which to scuplt colour and light.
It is also useful for Michael's wine, but he's got some Allister Malcolm "Platinum" goblets, which he vastly prefers to his Edinburgh Crystal "Iona"s. They languish at the back of a cupboard.
For beer, he uses a grey smoke coloured Wedgwood pint mug.
I prefer opals to deadly dull and boring diamonds any day, and in glass, I really don't see any difference between one load of death by a thousand cuts and the next.
It's just a geometrical pattern.

I like the fluidity of hot-worked glass, a moment, frozen in time.
For sparkles - I want sparklers. Moving, transient and ephemeral.

The problem with Britain and art is Britain is still stuck trying to crawl out of the
19th century, as it is with many, many other things.