Topic: Frosted decanter.

[flying free]

Thanks, the effect looks similar to the decanter that started this thread but hard to see from the photo. They don’t seem to differentiate between types of matte treatment though, for example on page 188 plate 224 is an 1885 vase that is also ‘matte treated’, but perhaps by then it was matte treated by acid rather than abrasion.

Just noticed that MacConnell The Decanter page 281 says “The [acid etch] technique was bolstered from 1860 by the invention in France of white acid, a hydrofluoric acid/alkali solution that left a matt-white effect similar to engraving. Pellatt and others exhibited white acid decoration in London in 1862 and Paris in 1867”.

So according to McConnell white acid frosting was invented (first?) in France in 1860 so presumably it was just mechanical abrasion before then. White acid from Pellat isn’t mentioned by Hajdamach or Northwood II that seem to say in the U.K. white acid was invented by John Northwood I in around 1867. Hajdamach also says white acid “was known on the Continent well before the 1867 date of Northwood’s use”. That sounds earlier than McConnell’s 1860.

I think I probably don't understand this topic very well however I've just come across some info I remember seeing many moons ago ... but couldn't find it at the time.
Source:
Journal from 1845

It is The Journal of the Franklyn Institute, Third Series, Volume IX dated 1845

https://www.google.co.uk/books/edition/Journal_of_the_Franklin_Institute/evlIAAAAMAAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1&dq=glass+uranium+bohemia++1843&pg=PA273&printsec=frontcover

See page 285 Chapter XII titled ' Of the Cutting of Glass'
(note - this is referring to Bohemian cut glass - journal is dated 1845)
where it says both mechanical grinding and acid were being used

https://www.google.co.uk/books/edition/Journal_of_the_Franklin_Institute/evlIAAAAMAAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1&dq=glass+uranium+bohemia++1843&pg=PA273&printsec=frontcover

[Ekimp]

Thanks for adding that. Shame he doesn’t go into a bit more detail, no mention of using a wire brush wheel as in the British patent from 1861 (mentioned reply 41). Hajdamach seems to say that Apsley Pellatt was quite dismissive of the acid process in 1849 (Hajdamach page 175).

[flying free]

I've just read a recent essay in the Heidelberg University Publishing that I don't want to link to in case of copyright.
From reading that, it seems the acid etching technique on glass actually goes back many centuries and was known about and used. 
There is an example of a really beautiful piece of acid etched glass from the 1600s in one of the German museums shown in the essay.

The author does mention Pellatt and appears to me to say that Pellatt didn't really mention acid etching.  That comment/part is curiously worded so I think I've understood what it meant correctly. Anyway, that seems to be similar to your comments about Charles Hajdamach's mention.
I'm surmising here but I suppose that could be because hand engraving was seen as real craft as opposed to acid etching, which I suppose could be seen as less craft/person technical if you see what I mean? Or it could be that acid etching had gone out of vogue.  It definitely was referenced as being known about, and used on glass, many centuries ago.

With regard to Pellatt, I think these things are always difficult to put real meaning to because for example I read in Bohemia they didn't focus on pressed glass because it would have taken away work from their glassmakers.  i.e. there was an economic reason why they continued with handmade glass in the 1800s not that they couldn't produce pressed glass (and I think there were a few makers who did). Pellatt may not have wanted to discuss it because they were hand cutting and hand engraving  at Falcon and why promote something you didn't use, or perhaps didn't feel had the same quality as hand engraved work?
 Or it could be that the technique of acid etching wasn't widely in use here/at that time frame even elsewhere, therefore Pellatt didn't cover it.
I've not checked your Hajdamach reference so apologies, and neither have I looked in the Pellatt book to see if anything was said at all on the subject.


The author of the essay does mention the 'launch' (my words) of acid etching in the UK in the mid 1800s as being when it took off.

[Ekimp]

Hi, thanks for posting this. Sorry for late reply but been busy. I found the article, which looks interesting, but not had time to read thoroughly. I have included a link incase anyone else is interested. I’m sure there can be no copyright issues with a link that only directs to the original material and if none of the content is replicated on here.

https://heiup.uni-heidelberg.de/catalog/view/821/1924/101074#toc

[flying free]

Curiosities of Glass-making 1849 , Pellatt says:

page 127
'Etching by fluoric acid has been introduced, but its bite is not sufficiently rough, and is not found effective for general purposes'.

By '... has been introduced' , I don't know if he means at Falcon Glass Works or just generally in the glass trade per se.

He talks about a 'ground roughed with sand' which reads to me as though they were sand etching backgrounds then polishing details on top with a wheel - page 126

 “ Copper wheels and finely-pulverised emery, mixed with oil, are used to execute the outline and ground of the modern engraver’s work; and for the polished work, lead wheels and very finely-pulverised emery are employed. Coarse patterns for hall-lamps are engraved by the glass-cutter’s smoothing-wheel. The contrast of the polish of a w'ood-wheel upon a ground roughed by sand is often effective, though the range of pattern is somewhat curtailed by the large size of the cutter’s wheels rendering it difficult to execute curvilinear designs. "