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Who made the Caithness thimbles? When?

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wrightoutlook:
Just curious as to if anybody specific made the Caithness paperweight-style thimbles. Would a number of glass artisans worked on them or one specific craftsperson? Also, were they made over an extended or a short period of time?

Thanks.

http://i14.tinypic.com/2mqm49y.jpg Moderator: Dead link

Frank:
Introduced in 1978, I show the 89 ones already. They were very successful I believe.

http://www.scotlandsglass.co.uk/cms/index.php?page=shop.browse&category_id=143&option=com_virtuemart&Itemid=27

ALLAN:
The actual glass thimble part were bought blank in a variety of colours and the mini paperweights were made in the Wick factory.The "stones" as we call them were made on a lampwork torch then ground down and glued on to the blanks.The later ranges included some lampwork flowers which were made by myself and Rosette Fleming in Perth and then sent to wick for putting on the blanks.I don't know all of the names of the people that made the "stones" in Wick but the longest serving was Christina Davidson.Originally all the canes for the "stones" were made in Wick but then that process was switched to Perth in the 80's when the various jewellery ranges took off and resulted in a bigger demand for cane,which could only be achieved at the Perth site.

Frank:
Jewellery was of course an idea of Paul Ysart and you can read more here http://www.ysartglass.com/PaulYsart/PYP5over.htm It was the involvement of Stratton jewellers and non silver that gave it the big boost that Allan mentions.

Allan do you have any pics of these later thimbles.

Also read Colin Terris accounts here
http://glasswatch.mysite.wanadoo-members.co.uk/ <---- Mod: Link dead

Colin shared most of his material with me, only I tend not to show the complete leaflets. You might notice a mix up between what Colin design and what Lucia Polanski designed. The opposing statement both came from Colin so until Lucia can be tracked down the truth cannot be found out. I settled on the first account Colin gave me but he uses his second account on his site  :?  If anyone knows of a Lucia Polanski (Not an uncommon name unfortunately.) that was a jeweller or designer c1970, please ask her to contact me.

Frank:
Allan my list of stone makers was

Stones made by:
Paul Ysart 1970-73
Peter Holmes 1973-75
After 1975
Various Caithness workers, including James MacBeath and Syd Thomson.
After 2001 at Perth various staff and John Deacons during 2002.

Latter names from Colin.

I also had
--- Quote ---The cane puller who headed the team at Wick left around the end of 2001 and Caithness decided to move cane pulling for their jewelery from Wick to Perth, in order to rationalise the making of canes for paperweights and for jewelery into one place. This resulted in a shortage of certain skills at Perth, and John Deacons was contracted to make canes for their jewelry from mid 2002 until about Christmas 2002
--- End quote ---


Was Christina Davidson the one leaving in 2001?

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