Topic: E.Varnish mercury glass with embossed seal, circa 1849

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Topic: Where was the glass blown?   - notes re James Powell and Sons records


I found a note here in this online book (part available)
Guide to the Archive of Art and Design , Victoria and Albert Museum, 2001. Lomas, Elizabeth

It says:

Quote -
'RELATED MATERIAL
Archive and Manuscript sources
See also in this guide. Thomas Cowell, stained glass artist and designer, papers, (c.1880-1985)
     Thomas Cowell worked for James Powell & Sons (Whitefriars) Ltd from 1884 to 1932,
     becoming the principle glass painter.
Records (1850-1973). Museum of London
Design (1871-1976).  Victoria and Albert Museum, Prints, Drawings and Paintings department.'  -  End.



- So, it appears that the records available as above date the earliest to 1850. 
- It is remotely possible that there might be a record in the British Museum, simply because F. H. Thomson first asked for a double-walled item to be made (asking Mellish to get one made, and where Mellish seems to have taken an inordinate amount of time to get the task done according to the court case) in 1849.
- Since the records start in 1850, I have to say I find it hard to believe that no-one has had a look and discovered whether or not Powell & Sons blew the Varnish & Co and Hale Thomson and co plugged items.  But anyway.




Source:

Guide to the Archive of Art and Design , Victoria and Albert Museum, 2001. Lomas, Elizabeth

Click here to view

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Topic:  Where was the glass blown?    -  BINGO


Well, at least for some of it.  And most likely for the piece exhibited in the V&A that Kev and I discussed earlier.

FINE BRITISH & EUROPEAN CERAMICS & GLASS
24 MAY 2006 | 12:00 AM BST
LONDON

Click here to view


'95
A rare and interesting Bohemian engraved part-amber stained and 'silver' lined goblet and cover
the glass probably Meistersdorf or Steinschönau, retailed by Varnish and Co., London, circa 1850

the globular form cut with a large large octagonal panel and engraved with a Turk standing beside his mount, the reserve cut with panels of hobnail diamonds and a lens, above an octagonal stem and foot with scalloped edge, the openwork domed cover in the form of a crown, the sides cut with cross-cut diamonds, ball and cross finial, the interior with mercurial lining
Quantity: 2
'E.VARNISH & Co. PATENT LONDON' repeated three times in the metal around the rim, the top of the foot incised '30 X'
40.5cm., 15 7/8 in.
READ CONDITION REPORTSALEROOM NOTICE
EXHIBITED
The Wallace Collection, London, 'From Palace to Parlour', 21st August-26th October 2003, no.212
LITERATURE
Exhibition catalogue, 'From Palace to Parlour', The Glass Circle, p.89
CATALOGUE NOTE
A very similar example, dated 1839, was sold by Fischer Auktions, Heilbronn, 22nd October 1994, lot 1129.

When this example was exhibited in 2003, it was suggested that the glass may have been made by James Powell and Sons, Whitefriars Glasshouse in London and engraved by a Bohemian artist working in London. However, as the glass appears not to contain lead-oxide it is therefore more likely to have been imported from Bohemia.

The patent for making silvered glass was taken out by Edward Varnish on 19th August 1849 but was discontinued in 1851 when the handling of raw mercury became illegal.'



It doesn't explain the double-walled items which are not glued or fixed together but it, along with no other current evidence, in my opinion places a  question mark against the constant refrain of 'probably made at James Powell and Sons.


Note: - The last comment in the quote from Sotheby's may not be correct based on evidence on this thread:
- They were not silvered using mercury
- The patent was taken out by Thomson and Varnish
- It seems they were discontinued because Thomson had been embezzled.

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Topic:  Remember the York goblet?



Earlier in the topic (see reply #143)
http://www.glassmessages.com/index.php/topic,65670.msg367784.html#msg367784

I posted a report from Soyer about how he presented three goblets at the York Banquet in 1850, all from Thomson and Varnish, one for York (green), one for London (green) and one for the Prince (&Queen presumably) (Red)

The City of London goblet (green) is in CH British Glass pp260.
The Red one was according to  CH British Glass in the Osborne House collection

The York one (green) is in the Fitzwilliam:
Click here to view


Accession:
Object Number: C.51-1972
(Applied Arts)
(record id: 26051; input: 2001-04-03; modified: 2016-08-11)


Note that the Fitzwilliam description says:

1) Firstly, James Powell & Sons probably,
then says
'May have been made by James Powell & sons.

2) the goblet is 'double-blown lead glass'

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I am now 99.9% certain that Thomson was silvering Bohemian glass as part of their work.
I have seen an example with a rim marked E. Varnish and metal lined and that was made I believe by Harrach and later silvered and had a metal lining and rim put on it.  It dates many years earlier than 1849.

Of course it is possible that Harrach re-made more or less exactly the same pieces many years later.  Or that the dated version has been adulterated and an earlier date inscribed onto it at a much later date.  But I am erring on the side of not on both counts.

And that is what I suspect has been done to the one in the V & A which I also suspect is Bohemian probably made by Harrach. [ * ]

The fact remains that the silvering was the amazing addition to  these pieces, which were beautifully made and decorated in their own right.  But the silvering was an 'addition' or 'enhancement' depending on your artistic 'eye' I guess. This also explains the newspaper report I found in the Frankfort Zeitung - I hadn't been able to properly understand what they meant before.  Now I do.

Paul have you any feedback from Judith yet please?  I think they might need to amend their write up.

I do not think the others are from the same source though - i.e. the plainly decorated just by cutting (by comparison to the one in the V&A) coloured double-glass-walled items that have been silvered.

[ * ] Edited to add:
The V&A do not mention a metal liner in their vase, so they may have lined it differently.

m

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Topic:  What happened to Frederick Hale Thomson?

1) On the 23rd June 1853 Frederick Hale Thomson filed for Bankruptcy.

2) I have also added in this post - his death notice which has some detail about him.
It's mainly about his his surgeon year but  refers to his glass company as the 'Glass-Silvering Company' and calls it a 'speculation'.
It links his death to this venture.


1) Bankruptcy notice in the Press gazette:
https://www.thegazette.co.uk/London/issue/21455/page/1900/data.pdf


This led to the following posts, one about his death (reply#198)
http://www.glassmessages.com/index.php/topic,65670.msg368239.html#msg368239

And the other in memorium which talks about the failure of his business and how it affected him(reply#197)
http://www.glassmessages.com/index.php/topic,65670.msg368235.html#msg368235



So he may have still been making silvered glass items (I'm thinking more finger plates, plates for boxes, smaller more mass produced items possibly?) after September 1851 when the company (Thomson, Varnish and Cookney) was disbanded.



2) Death notice in the Lancet:
Click here to view




m

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This is interesting:

A silvered glass scent bottle with a cork stopper still sealed, in the Pitt Rivers Museum.

http://objects.prm.ox.ac.uk/pages/PRMUID25731.html

The story that goes with it (according to the museum) is the lady who owned it said it contained a witch and that it should not be opened.

I wonder if that story comes from the known effect of using mercury to silver glass.  Mercury poisoning was terrible and eventually killed.  Hence the caution for it not to be opened.

I'm just adding it because it is a silvered glass item in a shape I've not seen before.  I have no idea what process was used to silver it.

m

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Topic:  how the glass was 'cut on the inside, coloured and silvered' - see reply #156 onwards for the start of this discussion

See page 179, under point 2  and under point 4 for the answer to this conundrum- it seems the Art Journal were talking about two flat pieces of glass being sandwiched together so in this instance they weren't describing double-walled vases I don't think (although Thomson says in the court case I think, that he never put the Thomson Mellish patent of 1850 into practice as the machine wasn't installed to do it, and he says he doesn't recall showing any of these items at the exhibition iirc).

I think this type of item might have been used for (or thought of for use for but then never made)  lids of glass boxes or for finger plates on doors for example (obviously not the part of two pieces being sandwiched together for the finger plates though)

And I think it is this type of item to which the Art Journal were referring in their descriptions.  So when they say they looked raised but were completely flat to the touch, they were in the instance of things like finger plates.

Click here to view

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Topic: Technical issues   

a) how did Sotheby's know that goblet was not lead glass?


b) how do they know the Varnish glass items are lead glass?


c) I wonder if this is how the goblets were silvered?





Discussion:
a)  Did Sotheby's carry out technical tests on that 'possibly Harrach' (my words) goblet to ascertain it was not lead glass? or is there some other way?

b) The Fitzwilliam says their goblet is lead glass - did they carry out technical tests to ascertain this, or is there some other way of knowing if their green cased glass is lead glass?

c) Is it possible that the bowl of the item was blown and cased and formed into a double-walled shape , then the stem and foot were blown and cased in a separate hollow shaped piece then attached to the bowl. And then, that Thomson's workshop cut the hole in the foot where the pontil mark would have been, and 'drilled' through the base of the goblets outer layer at the bottom, then poured in the silver.  Would that explain how they were silvered at least? Then the whole thing covered up by having a metal disc in the base covered by a glass cover. 

No one is going to undo the disc to have a check to see are they?

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So the flat plates which were  'cut/engraved , 'stained' with colour glass and silvered on the reverse' of a 'flat plate, completely smooth to touch' type thing, might have been used for something like this example -

i.e. the surrounds to a mirror

http://www.christies.com/lotfinder/Lot/a-north-italian-engraved-clear-and-cobalt-5338727-details.aspx


But not done in the same way as a double-walled vase.

m

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Question:  The glass needed to be at 160 degrees for the silver process to work ...

Click here to view


... So how?? did he keep/get the items to 160 degrees to make the silver process work?   Is that rubbish?

or is that how enamels were baked on as well?  is that the right temperature or similar ish?
or is it about the right temperature that would have been used by a glassmaker gilding glass on the exterior with gilded decoration?

and how did he do this? 


Re Reply #207 - next question - is it possible they are beautifully formed but all formed in one piece including stem and foot?  That seems to be the way my Bohemian goblet is made - I think it's made in one piece.