Glass Message Board
Glass Discussion & Research. NO IDENTIFICATION REQUESTS here please. => British & Irish Glass => Topic started by: Simba on April 03, 2012, 10:28:54 AM
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Can anywone help with the maker of this griffin vase ? Some books attribute this mould to Sowerby and the only others I have seen are either in vitro-porcelain or slag glass. This green colour of mine doesn't look like a Sowerby green, I have also seen this mould attributed to Edward Moore ?
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Hi, I just came across your post while researching the same vase. The Victoria & Albert museum has this design attributed to Edward Moore & Co circa 1880, shown in their online collections:
http://collections.vam.ac.uk/item/O6582/vase-edward-moore-co/
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Slack (p108) says there is no evidence that these are Sowerby (the colours are wrong) but that Edward Moore is likely as they are colours patented by Edward Moore
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Yes you are right, I sent pictures to the curator of Glass - Angus McDonald, at South Shields Museum, he has been writing a book about South Shields glass baron Edward Moore. He very kindly rang me and we had a long chat about this piece and he says it is by Moore. ;D
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Ask him to let us know when the book is out!
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Good idea, I'll do that !! ;)
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Here are a pair in light blue.
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I like those ones in light blue :)
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I thought they might be scarce but there a fair few survivors on google in all colours, I just wonder how many were made.
The title of this link could do with changing as people still sell these as Sowerby.
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Slack (p108) says there is no evidence that these are Sowerby (the colours are wrong) but that Edward Moore is likely as they are colours patented by Edward Moore
I think I've found the source of the Sowerby attribution. Barbara Morris states that: "a vase in this design was bought by the Museum of Decorative Arts in Prague direct from Sowerby & Co. in 1868." How true this is I've no idea but it's an interesting avenue to investigate. it could well be that this was a mix-up but then again there's always the possibility that the Sowerby attribution is correct or that the pattern was made by both firms.
Reference: Morris, B. 1978 Victorian Table Glass and Ornaments London: Barrie and Jenkins
Lattimore shows this design (in blue and black marbled glass) unattributed along with two other possibly related vases with similar neoclassical motifs.
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Many years ago I was talking to glass dealer Ronald Inch in the Portabello Road, he said he had a collector who had 26 of these vases in different colours and was looking for more.
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:o Wow !!
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Can't manage to find 26 of them (26 wow!) but am adding three more links for reference:
Turquoise slag - fab! http://1st-glass.1st-things.com/gallery-slag/slides/turquoise-slag-glass-vase.html
Blue slag: http://1st-glass.1st-things.com/gallery-slag/slides/mooregriffinslagvase.html
Pair of amber: http://1st-glass.1st-things.com/gallery-victorian/slides/vvmooregriffinvases.html
;D
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White opaque glass:
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these things do seem to have a special appeal for some people - about a dozen surfaced in the two separate sales of the Michael Parkington collection, back in 1997 and 1998 - so he was obviously quite keen, and had managed to collect what look to be most of the varieties of marbled glass colours, plus a pair of what were described by Christies as 'jet'.
Apart from the pair in jet, Christies used the word 'malachite' to describe all of the various marble colours - which we probably wouldn't do now, preferring to say marbled, although Christies did refer to the moulding as representing swans - which agrees with the books.
The auction house included the 'attributed to Sowerby & Co.' statement, but went on to say 'unknown maker, and gave the Barbara Morris reference quoted above.
I wouldn't dare comment on these things since I know nothing about them, but my interpretation of Ray Slack's comments are that he wasn't suggesting that all of the colours are wrong for Sowerby ....... he says "appear in many colours which are not associated with Sowerby".
I get the impression that Sowerby made a variety of colours in marble glass (malachite), plus of course white vitro-porcelain, and jet.
Regret I've not seen a single example - but agree they're appealing ...... is the connection along the same lines as Leda and the swan?
The Victorians were big on these Greek classical mythology things .. or perhaps it's just a vase with three swans ;)
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Thanks for adding this Paul, it's an interesting topic.
I also found there is a 3-page article in German (PDF) on pressglas-korrespondenz.de here: www.pressglas-korrespondenz.de/aktuelles/pdf/pk-2006-4w-stopfer-moore-vase-schwaene.pdf
Eduard Stopfer says the vase is known in 3 sizes (the image from Slack is included in the article.)
Sigmar Geiselberger replies by saying, "For the first time I could with Mag. Markéta Tronnerová, Curator of Glass, the custodian of the Moravian Gallery in Brno [Moravian Gallery in Brno] Fall 2006 Such vase opaque blue, marbled pressed glass marvel at full size: had the dimensions to the pictures I not been taken seriously! These vases are there of around 17 cm up to 25 cm!"
That Sigmar has found them in a Czech glass museum in Brno is interesting, I thought.
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would agree with you Anne - although as we know glass does travel - and remarkably far at times it seems, but makes you wonder if there was a mould that also travelled .......... from memory the sizes quoted in the Christies catalogues for the Parkington examples are 17.00 and 17.50 cms. But 25 cms. does look to be substantially larger than those in the U.K. literature.
As everyone knows, there are trademarked Sowerby spill vases and flower troughs which are adorned with swans - so presumably a bird that was thought highly of at that time - perhaps because it has a Royal connection maybe?
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The two I have are 7 inches and 6 3/4 inches or 178mm and 172mm they must have come from different moulds may be ?
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Different moulds sounds likely. Quarter of an inch is within acceptable tolerances. The moulds were hand made after all. It's likely that more than one mould was in use at a time any way.
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White opaque gilded glass
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A Griffin vase in a grey slag colour.
Roy