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Glass Identification - Post here for all ID requests => Glass => Topic started by: flying free on October 13, 2014, 06:23:20 PM

Title: Understanding some explanations in The Crystal Years - STevens and Williams book
Post by: flying free on October 13, 2014, 06:23:20 PM
I'm trying to work through the explanation in The Crystal Years page 14 about Stevens and Williams and applied decoration.
It's very oddly worded (apologies to the author), in my opinion, in certain sections where the explanation is so vague that I'm having difficulty trying to ascertain specifics.

On page 14 it says:
'... where lampworkers were making wonderfully proportioned flowers and animals for local glass firms'.  Does this mean they were supplying lampworked ornaments of animals and flowers for sale by local glass firms? or does it mean that they were supplying them to glass firms to stick onto their vases? (if so, how on earth were they stuck on?  Wouldn't that process make the glass crack on the piece being applied as it is applied cold to a hot worked piece?  - having thought about it, it wouldn't be possible to stick a lampworked piece on a hot glass piece would it? )

On page 15 it says with no  understandable explanatory preamble:
'Leaves and flowers although handmade and good, did not suit either Stevens and Williams or John, so in 1885 a number of hand tools were developed in order to mould leaves and flowers separately'.
???? Sorry, I find this confusingly written.  If Leaves and flowers did not suit them why did they develop hand tools to mould leaves and flowers?
And does this imply that leaves and flowers were being made separately to apply to pieces at a factory?  Or does it imply that leaves and flowers were being produced as ornaments in their own right and Stevens and Williams didn't like them but did like the idea of making their own to be produced on hot glass pieces as they were being made?

I hope I've explained that properly.

There is reference on page 14 as well, to animals being produced by local lampworkers, but I can't find any reference to animals being applied to Stevens and Williams pieces specifically.
m