Glass Message Board
Glass Discussion & Research. NO IDENTIFICATION REQUESTS here please. => British & Irish Glass => Topic started by: zidori on September 25, 2006, 10:46:51 AM
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This looks like a Strathearn vase, 4 inches tall, but the colour almost feels like it is painted on. Is it a surface decoratd piece or a crude attempt to decieve? Any help with this would be much appreciated.
Regards
Ronnie
http://i9.tinypic.com/2q3oj7a.jpg
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Yes it is Ronnie, but before you get too excited they seemed to have made a lot of the colourway and shape/size and they do appear fairly often on eBay. The plus being that now you can feel the difference. Although they dont feel like Monart surface decorated for some reason :?
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Ronnie,
There is a Strathearn name for this range which unfortunately I have forgotten. Perhaps some Strathearn collector will put me out of my misery and remind me???
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Forgive my ignorance, but when you say 'surface decorated', do you mean marvered on, or how is it done? :oops:
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Hi Max,
Much of the early Monart had the colouring on the surface and often iridised due to contaminants in the gas which Moncrieff's made themselves. c 1926 they switched to using corporation gas which was much purer and did not iridise the enamels. Conjecture, gives this as the reaon for the switch to casing the enamels with clear glass. Thus with Monart surface decorated examples date from the first two years of production.
There is a element of doubt to some aspects of this but it can never be proven either way as only memories were available on the subject. Their does appear to be some evidence of surface decorated pieces being produced as late as 1929 but that is still being studied and no conclusions yet.
There were probably only a couple of thousand pieces made in the those first two years and cased pieces were being made to and hence this is extremely rare glass. A very small quantity was made in the 1950's by Paul Ysart but there is no way of distinguishing that from earlier pieces.
Vasart made a few pieces of surface decorated glass-ware in the Cloisonné technique. - Mostly lamps and vases and again extremely rare. Up until a few years ago it was assumed the Strathearn had not produced any and when pieces started to appear they came with the story that they were experimental batch of a couple of dozen. Dealers and glassmakers in the area are the source of some wonderful tales about the Ysart's and the glass they produced unfortunately much of it is pure fantasy and disprovable. This particular tale has turned out to be completely wrong and they were a regular part of later production including the small brown piece that started this topic.
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i've got a suface decorated paperweight by strathearn
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Hi ,
Ray are you going to post a picture of your weight as i havent seen a surface decorated one before,,, i do have a nice Strathearn surface decorated lamp though
Gary
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Frank. Thought I'd come back to this today, when I was less tired. :D
Thanks for your detailed explanation, but it assumed a level of knowledge which I don't have. :( I am familiar with the Cloisonne technique, due to you posting a photo here a while back, so that's a help with getting to know surface decoration. What I'm not sure of however, is what part the gas played...
I'll take a look at your site later, perhaps it's on there. I don't want you to go to the trouble of posting it, if it's already available to me. :D
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You might have to trawl through a lot of stuff to get explicit answers. Two articles on Monart and one on Moncrieff, probably mention it. As well as in the newsletters. The point is that originally the iridescence often prized on 'surface decorated' Monart was pure accident caused by poor quality home-made gas.
But the eseence of the answer to our question is that the enamels were marvered into the surface:
Cloisonné (http://www.ysartglass.com/Moncat/Colimages/Colour018.jpg)
Cloisonné (Iridised) (http://www.ysartglass.com/Moncat/Colimages/Colour064.jpg)
Paisley Shawl (http://www.ysartglass.com/Moncat/Colimages/Colour055a.jpg)
Stoneware (http://www.ysartglass.com/Moncat/Colimages/Colour029.jpg)(http://www.ysartglass.com/Moncat/Colimages/Colour004.jpg)
Pumice (http://www.ysartglass.com/Moncat/Images/A.jpg)
Only the terms Cloisonné and Paisley Shawl are factory originals.
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Cheers for the great pics and answering my question about marvering Frank. :D :D The irridised cloisonne looks superb, with or without its rarity value - wonderful stuff!
I think going to have to take a look at your site (about time, I hear you say!), as I'd like to find out more...and how that particular technique was achieved. Maybe I should have bought Chuggy's book... :roll:
The Pumice is interesting too - it looks rather Scavo to me. Egads. More to learn.
Thanks again. :D
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The rarest being the stuff with chunks of millefiori cane in, usually rather dreary colouring and only a handful are known to have survived... less than two dozen, if I am feeling generous. Paisley Shawl and Cloisonne are the most often found. 2 or 3 lamps are known in Paisley Shawl with one complete Mushroom lamp that changed hands for over 5 thousand pounds 15 years ago. All of the Monart that has sold over two thousand pounds was Paisley Shawl. There are a few other types that are fairly unique and would change hands in those prices ranges, were they ever to be sold.
The largest collection of early Monart was put together by a couple who started buying in the early 1930's and frequently visited the Ysart's in Scotland to obtain pieces. They passed away some time ago but their collection has yet to appear on the market.
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here you go Gary
http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b270/yorkshirebob/th_Picture1153.jpg
http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b270/yorkshirebob/th_Picture1150.jpg
http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b270/yorkshirebob/th_Picture1155.jpg
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Thanks Ray for the pic,
i have one of those as well in blue and white with Strathearn label, not too sure what there use really is, the one i have is flat and reminds me of a coaster more than a weight, there is an article with pics on Richard More"s site about these items,
Gary
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Wow! Thanks all for your contributions. I cannot believe my little brown vase has engendered such a wealth of fascinating information. This is why I love this Message Board.
Ronnie
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We are all whacko's 8) :D
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i was wondering Gary if these are the left over's from the tropic range, ie the bit that is left on the pontil iron after the weight has been cut off
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To get back to the original question Ronnie. Are you sure that vase was surface decorated? Could you feel a texture? It just looked like a cased, clear glass decoration to my eyes. These multi-coloured "spattered effect" pieces were fairly common in Strathearn. For Luckyslap, I THINK these were from a range called "Aurora". They did a range of paperweights in a very similar decoration. Best wishes to all, Martin.
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Ray said:
i was wondering Gary if these are the left over's from the tropic range, ie the bit that is left on the pontil iron after the weight has been cut off
I doubt this. Surely, the coloured chips around any "left overs" part on the punty iron would have been too small to do much with. And anyway, I imagine most of the "left overs" would have been removed from the iron by simply dunking in cold water, resulting in just a pale full of broken shards.
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Hi Martin
The surface of the vase is definitely textured. When I first picked it up I thought it had been painted over with a textured paint which made me think it was a fake Strathearn until I read about the surface decorated Monart pieces and wondered if Strathearn had used the same techniqu - hence the original question.
Thanks for your interest and input.
Ronnie