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Glass Identification - Post here for all ID requests => Glass Paperweights => Topic started by: cxgirl on October 05, 2015, 12:18:47 AM

Title: STK Paperweight Bowl
Post by: cxgirl on October 05, 2015, 12:18:47 AM
Hi,
Here is a bowl that came in a Perthshire box and is marked STK. From reading past posts this is the signature cane for John Deacon used on  a line called St Kilda. So is this a perthshire piece or just been put in the wrong box?
Mary
Title: Re: STK Paperweight Bowl
Post by: cxgirl on October 05, 2015, 12:44:35 AM
I just found a similar bowl that has a label in place that says Crieff Glass Ladymill Glassworks Dallerie, so not Perthshire.
Mary
Title: Re: STK Paperweight Bowl
Post by: daveweight on October 05, 2015, 10:13:25 AM
John Deacons told me he was asked in 1983 to design sand make an exclusive range of paperweights for the De Cora Import Company who were then in New York but this new range need a name so John named in St Kilda, after an island in the Hebrides, and made weights with an StK cane. This were actually made in the J Glass factory as was his first company and was still in operation then. St Kilda was not a company - just a brand name.
John's home is called Ladymill House so I hope this explains everything for you
Dave
Title: Re: STK Paperweight Bowl
Post by: chopin-liszt on October 05, 2015, 02:00:11 PM
I was shown a weight with a weird STK cane in it just last week - the letters are all reversed, a mirror-image, back-to-front.
Is that unusual? Is it just from the cane being accidentally put in the wrong way up?
Title: Re: STK Paperweight Bowl
Post by: KevinH on October 05, 2015, 04:48:28 PM
Yes, Sue, the cane was inserted the wrong way round.

It happens occasionally. I have an early Ysart weight, probably made by Salvador, with a reversed "S" cane.
Title: Re: STK Paperweight Bowl
Post by: chopin-liszt on October 05, 2015, 05:56:44 PM
Thanks, Kev.
The owner of the weight and I were much bemused by it, debating about what ends of sticks of rock would look like from the wrong side...  ;D
Title: Re: STK Paperweight Bowl
Post by: KevinH on October 05, 2015, 06:11:34 PM
It could be ok if a word was in capitals and was palindromic. I wonder how many words would be possible? Sounds like Cafe material to me!!
Title: Re: STK Paperweight Bowl
Post by: daveweight on October 06, 2015, 10:18:25 AM
Canes being put into a paperweight the wrong way round - or inverted - are nothing new. Take a look a my Bacarrat from 1848 - a drop too much wine with lunch perhaps ?
I did a long text in  my previous reply, edited it but forgot to alter the date so just to clarify matters; the De Cora Import Company were the main importers of Whitefriars to the USA and a lot of people thought when Whitefriars closed they had the StK weights made as a replacement but this is not so. John Deacons told my they actually approached him late 1979 or early 1980 before Whitefriars closed.
I have seen quite a few weights incorrectly advertised in Ebay as someone had put them in the wrong box, for example a Murano in a Perthshire box made the seller think they had a valuable weight so this can be misleading.
Dave
Title: Re: STK Paperweight Bowl
Post by: cxgirl on October 14, 2015, 10:26:24 PM
sorry, I missed these posts.
Thank-you for the information Dave! If this was made in the J Glass factory, would this  be considered St Kilda made by J glass or just referred to as a St Kilda paperweight?
Mary
Title: Re: STK Paperweight Bowl
Post by: daveweight on October 15, 2015, 10:58:16 AM
Hi Mary
I think your weight should be referred to as a St Kilda. J glass was a company John Deacons set up in 1978 and he could make whatever he liked there but St Kilda was just a brand name John used. He also made some weights with an StA cane called St Andrews, again in the J Glass factory. Due to a recession John closed the J Glass company in 1983 but I believe he still made a few StK weights afterwards when he worked on his own.
Hope this helps
Dave
Title: Re: STK Paperweight Bowl
Post by: cxgirl on October 15, 2015, 03:33:25 PM
Thanks very much Dave, your information is very helpful :)
Mary
Title: Re: STK Paperweight Bowl
Post by: Fuhrman Glass on November 20, 2015, 12:45:25 AM
I had  always heard that he signed these STK since he had an exclusive for J Glass in the U.S. with a large paperweight dealer in California, Larry Selman. This was his way of having 2 "non competing" distributors. I used to buy a lot of STK glass from Decora during this period.