Antique, vintage, and retro glass are smart choices for today’s home and office use, unique décor and special gift giving.
The well-made quality glass of yesteryear far outshines anything available in retail stores today. It comes from a time when products were designed and produced to please the consumer with beauty, quality, and usefulness. You can acquire this superior glass of times-gone-by at much better value than contemporary counterparts.
Real Glass is Organic
Since the beginning of recorded glassmaking until the late Mid-20th Century, glass objects were created according to a recipe provided by nature.
Nature created glass called Obsidian, Fulgurite, Desert Glass and more. It is a biomorphic substance requiring extreme high heat to transform the ingredients into molten liquid, then slow cooled into a hard translucent substance bearing no resemblance to the original ingredients. Mankind copied the glass making technique from nature.
Most glass objects created before 1970 were made with authentic glass. Incorporating metals and heated to an extreme high degree in on-site furnaces, then blown or molded into shape by hand by artists and craftsmen at great glass houses and infamous studios. The designs were carefully engineered with style, quality, form, and function in mind.
Contemporary Glass
Most new glass on the shelves of retail stores today is imported. Ninety-nine percent of modern glass objects come from China where it is mass produced by machines and human handlers.
China and other countries reproduce vintage and antique styles. The reproductions are poor in décor and quality. The décor on glass imports is brash and messy. The quality is that of disposables.
Mass produced glass objects are made of a pre-mixed glass which includes plastics and chemicals instead of metals. Much modern glass is lacquered with a substance which makes it look shiny. This ‘lacquer’ eventually washes off. It’s probable the temporary reflective lacquer is not good for our health if ingested.
Without the metals required for hardness, water can easily penetrate modern glass and leave calcium deposits that will not wash off. Imported glass weighs considerably less than what real glass would weigh because the recipe no longer contains metals. It’s cheap…and disposable.
Keeping the Art of Glass Alive
The cost of creating real glass skyrocketed due to regulation burdens, expensive energy to the heat the furnace, and the high cost and scarcity of metals. Many of the great glass makers of the past have vanished.
To offset the cost of glass, contemporary makers use a modern recipe containing plastic compounds which melt at a much lower temperature. Most metals have been omitted.
Hand-formed glass continues to be produced in our time by exceptional artists throughout the world. Chihuly, a major American glass artist, founded a glass school called Pilchuck in the Pacific Northwest, U.S.A. where masters and students produce hand-formed glass. But today the glass objects are formed using rods of prefab modern glass in assorted colors and melted with hand-held torches.
Some traditional glassmaker brands are produced today. The brand names Steuben (American), Salviati (Italian), Iittala, (Scandinavian), Waterford (Ireland) and more, have all survived the 20th Century. Their glass objects can be found at upper-crust retail stores and boutiques. All mentioned here have been acquired by major companies/investors and the manufacturing of glass objects carrying their name is outsourced to other countries. Metals have been omitted from the brand’s glass recipes. Even Waterford no longer uses lead, a necessary ingredient for fine crystal.
Save Money and Energy on Quality Products
Buying old beautiful glass for décor or gifts saves money and energy. Antique (over 70-years-old), vintage (40 to 70), and retro (20 to 40) glass objects can be purchased at a fraction of what the same glass would cost if it were made today.
Old glass is of better quality and less expensive. And as a plus for everyone, there’s big savings in energy when you buy vintage glass instead of new. The incredible amount of energy needed to make the glass of days gone by has already been spent. Buying new glass means you are buying products made with new energy in an energy strapped world.
Well-designed, real glass from the past can accentuate all contemporary home and office décor styles of today. The last gasp of studio craft artistry produced a wide range of fabulous shapes, styles, forms and colors of glass objects. Decorating with retro, vintage and/or antique glass is fun, colorful, distinctive, creative, and provides for statement making focal points.
Buy distinctive and beautiful old glass. You’ll be happier. Your item will be unique, will gain in value, can be passed down to your children and will cost less and be of better quality than retail glass of today. To top it off, you’ll be doing a bit to conserve new energy…and every little bit helps.