Surprises

derived from fabrile, meaning handmade or belonging to a craftsman.

Several glass firms made iridescent glass in the early 1900s, but Tiffany’s soft, incandescent sheen of lustrous favrile glass, inspired by colours found on excavated antique Syrian and Roman glass, was unique.

Tiffany’s Jack in the pulpit vases were made in different sizes and colour combinations, achieved by dissolving salts of rare metals in molten glass and keeping them in an oxidised state in the kiln to produce chemical reactions.

Some were also sprayed with chloride, which made the surface break up into fine lines that picked up the light. Gold lustre is said to have been made from gold coins dissolved in hydrofluoric acid.

Needless to say, such glassware is out of reach for all but the wealthiest collectors, but we found a golden iridescent “Tiffany” Jack in the Pulpit vase decorated with at an upmarket antiques fair last month for £285.

The dealer was quick to point out that the base had been engraved with the Tiffany name by some devious chancer. In fact, the vase was made in the Loetz glassworks, founded in 1836 in the Southern Bohemian town of Klostermühle, today part of the Czech Republic. Hence the price.

Jack in the Pulpit-style glassware has been made in both opaque and in colours such as cranberry, milk, peachblow, and “Vaseline” yellow, more correctly termed uranium glass and the list of makers who produced and still produce it is lengthy.

But what of Stevens & Williams? Established in Stourbridge in the West Midlands in 1776, the glassworks at Moor Lane, Brierly Hill passed from Richard Honeybourne to Joseph

Silver in 1824 and then to William Stevens and Samuel Williams, who each married Silver’s daughters.

Stevens & Williams was founded in 1847 and became noted in particular for producing quality decorative glass, using techniques such as freehand engraving, acid etching, enamelling, and cameo cutting from about 1880 under the direction of John Northwood and his protégé Frederick Carder.

The firm patented “Damascened” glass in 1885, which featured silver or copper design surfaces; “Jewelled” and “Pearl

Satin” glass, the latter looking like mother of pearl, and, in 1888. “Moss-Agate” glass, which gave the effect of crazed semi-transparent alabaster.

Interestingly, Carder made his name in America where he co-founded the famed Steuben glassworks in Corning, New York.

Stevens & Williams became Royal Brierley Crystal in 1931 following a visit by the Duke and Duchess of York and is now owned by Dartington Ltd.