Topic: paperweight ID- spells Clichy but... ID = Murano

[luckysmom]

Hi there,
 can anyone help ID this paperweight? It has a big sans serif "C" along with the other letters inside some of the canes. I think there might be a date too, but heres the thing, I'm just not that lucky! Sadly every paperweight I get excited about and think is finally a good paperweight always turns out to be a copy!
I'm crossing my fingers that its possible this is really a Clichy, but like I said, I'm just not that lucky!
I inherited this paperweight a few years ago, and have had someone examine it that also thought it was Clichy, but like i said....I don't have the kind of luck that it would take for this to be a signed clichy......!
Steph

[luckysmom]

more pics..

[marc]

Hi Steph,

Looks like Murano to me.

Best regards.
Marc.

[RescoCCC]

Agreed. Murano.

[mildawg]

Think you have the wrong picture on ebay!

[tropdevin]

***

Hi.  100% Murano...nothing like any Clichy I have seen, I'm afraid.  The 'C' shape happens fairly regularly in paperweights, when a circular part of a cane design is interrupted or obscured. There are only a few, well documented and very specific Clichy signature canes: any other C shapes are serendipity.

Alan

[RescoCCC]

It's really kind of spammy to list weights on eBay with Clichy in the title when you know they are not Clichy.

[Nick77]

Hi Steph,

As has been pointed out your current paperweights you have posted are Murano, I hope the ones you bought at auction were not described as Clichy if so go back and get a refund. Your weights are actually quite nice examples of Murano but certainly not in the same price bracket.

Below are some cane examples from some of my Clichy weights to help your future ID's, I'm sure you can see the difference in the quality of the canes here from the Murano ones. The last photo is of a Clichy C, again as you can see it is quite distinctive, very obviously is a letter C and always is within a high quality complex cane.

Nick

[Nick77]

Further to my last post above, also to aid your identifications in future, Antique French weights do not have a flat polished base, they will have a polished concave base with just a slim outer wear ring on which the paperweight rests so that scratches don't show through from the base, as in the Baccarat weight from 1848 in the first photo below.

 The only general exception where a base is flat, would be in a weight that has a wheel cut base, either star cut or diamond cut as in the second photo of a St. Louis weight with diamond cut base.
 
Apart from the very oldest weights Murano weights will have a completely flat polished base, if it has the general appearance of a Murano weight but the base is flat but unpolished (frosty) most likely it is a Chinese Murano style copy.
 
I'm sure you posted your items on ebay before they were correctly identified and will amend them accordingly?

Hope that helps

Nick

[tropdevin]

***

Hi Nick.

I too would hope that anyone selling an obvious Murano would list it as such, and not try to deceive people.

Alan