Topic: Sowerby butter dish Rd. 91432 - 14.01.1888

[Paul S.]

I did punch this No. into the Board's 'Glass Gallery' search, but nothing came up, so am assuming we've not had it on the Board previously -  always good to have another item for Fred
As well as the Registration No. itself, there is also the Peacock's head - and both are on the inside of the bowl part.           About 5.25 inches tall (135 mm).

[agincourt17]

Thank you, Paul. Nice photo BTW.

I see that Cottle describes RD 91432 as 'Sugar Basin', and Thompson as ''Pattern of sugar (imit. cut and mitres), so the design is for the decorative pattern rather than the shape.

The butter dish that you show appears as Sowerby pattern 1970 on page 19 of pattern book XV (1895) alongside the matching cream jug and [covered] sugar basin. This is another one of those cases where the pattern book images don't really do justice to the quality of the design.

I didn't have any reference photos or correlation for these, so an uncommon Sowerby pattern, and more pieces fitted to the Sowerby RD / pattern numbers 'jigsaw'.

The images will be added to the Sowerby pattern number and GMB RD database albums on the Glass Queries Gallery shortly.

Fred.

[Paul S.]

thanks Fred   -    so obviously, as you say, the original Registration for this design appeared on a sugar and not a butter dish, showing it was a protection for decoration rather than shape - factory decorative pattern No. 1970 for all pieces, whatever the shape.                   With your experience and knowledge of these things, do you think this change of approach by the factory, whereby they became less concerned with Registering shapes, perhaps - and concentrated more on decoration such as this one for example -  was something that occurred more frequently after the demise of the lozenge period?             Rd. 91432 was Registered some four/five years after the end of the diamond period  -  and I suppose to some extent you could argue that there is a limit to the variety of shapes of sugars, butters, vases, etc. etc. that can be invented, and perhaps better to concentrate on decoration.             Maybe some time around the early 1880s Sowerby considered they had possibly exhausted the range of potential useful and practical shapes.

I would of course have included the National Archives image for this Registration, if I already had it, but for items post 1884 I have to make a visit, usually, to find them, and will include this one on my next trip to Kew, and post in due course.

Yes, thanks to Dirk's lessons in photography, my pix have improved, but the horizon line is not ideal and although I'm not entirely sure believe my mistake when bending the Perspex was to create the right angle with too sharp a bend.               3 mm Perspex isn't easy to bend and I recall it took ages with the heat gun  -  if doing this project again I'd be inclined to bend the stuff over a curved former to avoid this unwanted horizon line appearing in the pictures.

[agincourt17]

I look forward to seeing the design representation for Sowerby RD 91432 in due course.

As to Sowerby registrations for pattern rather than shape in the post-lozenge period, I agree that pretty well every basic variation in shape for domestic glassware seems to have tried by then and so finding a 'unique' design feature for shape must have become increasingly difficult. Not only that, but decorative patterns seem to have been trending towards imitating the elaborate, heavily geometric designs that were becoming fashionable cut into hand-blown English crystal vases and tableware at the time. There were, however, still some novelty designs registered where the shape was obviously the unique feature of the design (e.g., RD 13792 money box in the shape of a post pillar box), and others where novelty shapes and pattern seem to have been registered together, presumably to distinguish them from similar novelty shapes with different patterns manufactured by competitors ( e.g.,  RD 52434  pattern and shape of boat stand; RD 87058 pattern shape of shoe; RD 95300 gondola shape with imitation cut).

Fred.

[Paul S.]

Here then is the National Archive image from Kew  -  showing that the original shape on which the Registration is based, was indeed a stemmed/footed sugar.     Not such a good picture, but adequate I think to see details.

[agincourt17]

Thank you, Paul.

Fred.