Topic: Thomas Webb — heat sensitive? — akin to Alexandrite?

[flying free]

Thank you for all the additional and very interesting information Paul
I've done lots of looking around and there doesn't seem to be any maker anywhere that made the tri-colour (4/5 colour ? if amber, rose, purple, blue and chocolate rim all showing) anything like Webb's Alexandrite at all.  I've not happened upon a piece of amberina I fancy yet either.  Still I'm sure I'll find one that becomes a must-have at some point 
m

[Paul S.]

since we've come so far off-topic, I'll add a bit more just to confound the issue further

I notice that the Truitt's book shows a Rindskopf product which the factory called 'Grenada'  -  superficially very much another Amberina lookalike, with examples showing wrythen and optic ball-moulding.
Although the authors don't discuss this product in depth, they do comment that it was made c. 1900 at the Barbarahόtte factory which   "was best known for its production of iridized glass during the art nouveau period, and such pieces were given names such as Grenada, Ahambra, and Pepita".

As an iridized (or Carnival) type of glass, the colour is quite strident, and of a far deeper/darker colour than would be associated with Carnival glass, usually.......  colour wise, some of it looks a good contender for Mt. Washington's 'Rose Amber'.
Also, presumably, using salts rather than a coloidal gold solution to achieve the colour it was no doubt one of those eastern European products, imitating bona fide Amberina, that so worried The New England Glass and Mt. Washington companies.
In view of the method of using salts to achieve this colour, presumably it's legitimate to call Rindskopf's Grenada a type of 'Carnival' glass??

If anyone has any of these iridized pieces from Rindskopf, it would be interesting to hear their comments.

Certainly on the page, these iridized products 'look the part'  -  but of course in the flesh they may well not stand up to scrutiny when compared to genuine Amberina/Rose Amber.

[Lustrousstone]

I think the iridising is over the colour, not what creates it

[Ivo]

If it's pressed and iridised you may call it carnival. Otherwise not.

[Paul S.]

thanks to both of you for the clarification on these points.

[Bernard C]

...   I bet Bernard wishes he'd never started this one  

Paul — not at all.   Many of the most interesting discussions on the GMB have arisen off-topic.   I'm not sure whether this comes into the "most interesting" category, but it is certainly lengthy.

Kevin — Grateful thanks for your valiant efforts to keep this topic on the straight and narrow.   I gave it up as a lost cause before you.   

I'm thinking of restarting this topic, without using the A-word or the other A-word, urging contributors to do likewise.

Bernard C. 

[flying free]

mmm, yes it has drifted off topic rather at a tangent.  But I think that is because the piece in question was being queried as to whether it was created via a heat sensitive method. 
From what has been said on the thread I read it that so far opinion is that the original piece at the start of the thread was possibly not created through a heat sensitive method of creating colour, but possibly through 'casing' the clear glass with amethyst.  This might possibly have been achieved through blowing one bubble of glass into another?

And with regard to the petal shaped rims, I have found three more pieces in Gulliver's that have petal shaped rims, but which are not ascribed to Thomas Webb's.  One of which is on page 201 and actually has a ten petal rim. Since Gulliver also shows a recorded design drawing / pattern from Webb with a ten petal rim, in the back of the book, it's curious that he then doesn't identify the piece on page 201 as Webb.  That might be because his parameters for ascribing a piece to a maker were that they had to be in the pattern books.   Or it could be that he did not look at the pattern books and because it does not have an rd number on it, he did not ascribe it.
Or it might be because that piece could not be found in the pattern books and  there is some query over whether other makers also made the ten petal shaped rim.
m

[Bernard C]

M — Gulliver only attributes when he is 100% certain.   That gives you, his reader, an interesting extra piece of information.   Look through all his Webb registered design style petal rims and see if he attributes any to a different maker.   See where I'm going?   It's rather like Bill Heacock realising that Butler Brothers, glass wholesalers, didn't unpack their barrels, one of the most important discoveries for the attribution of EAPG.

As you're counting petals, here's another for you: http://fieldingsauctions.co.uk/lot/105570   

Bernard C. 

[flying free]

Yes, and they have an engraved rd number on them to identify them.

There's quite a few with engraved RD Numbers on them.  Why would some have the number engraved on them and some not I wonder?
m

[Paul S.]

is it possible that.......  with any given new decorative design that a factory wished to protect, the initial  pieces of whatever shape that carried that new feature, also carried the diamond (or Rd. No.), to ward off any potential copying.
Possibly, subsequent and differently shaped pieces, even though they might include the earlier Registered decorative feature, might have omitted the diamond or Rd. No., since the decorative design was already Registered.   ....??