Sulphide portrait glassware is blown, cut, and molded glassware usually made from lead crystal that encases an image. The image appears silver or white, as if made from silver sulphide. Although sulphide is used to describe glass decorated in this manor, the silver or white image is actually a hardened clay paste. Experiments with this glass decorating style began in Europe during the late 18th century, and processes for production were successfully implemented in France and England during the early 19th century. Production in the United States began in the 1820s. Pittsburgh glass manufacturer Bakewell, Page and Bakewell was the first major manufacturer of sulphide portrait glassware in the United States. During the 1820s, sulphide portrait glassware ornamentation style was known as cameo–incrustation or crystallo ceramie. This type of glassware became popular again during the middle of the 19th century. Bakewell, Page and Bakewell used an unusual style for their sulphide portrait tumblers. The portrait was at the bottom of the tumbler, while the sides of the ware featured engravings. The men portrayed in these tumblers were famous historical figures, such as Marquis de Lafayette, George Washington, and Benjamin Franklin. Also portrayed were then current politicians that were champions of causes that favored the domestic glass producing industry, such as Andrew Jackson and DeWitt Clinton.
Background
In the glass industry, a sulphide is a glass object that contains an image encased in the glass that appears as white porcelain. These images can also appear to be silver. Inserting the object, or cameo, into the glass was the most difficult part of the production process. There could be no air bubbles between the cameo and the glass. The cameo needed to be white, which could give it a silvery appearance when viewed through the glass. Historians at the end of the 19th century speculated that the silvery objects encased in glass were made of silver sulphide, although the objects were actually made of a clay paste. The name "sulphide", although not correct, has continued to be the term used to describe glass decorated using this method. Glassmakers in Bohemia are thought to have unsuccessfully experimented with sulphide production during the late 18th century. This may have occurred as early as 1750, although one source uses "about 1780". No examples of the Bohemian experimentation have been found that date before 1798. In the early 19th century, a French medallion maker began encasing his product in glass, and a similar product was made in England at about the same time. Sulphide portrait glassware was most popular between 1815 and 1830. At the time, the objects were described as cameo–incrustation or crystallo ceramie. During the first 30 years of the 19th century, French sulphides were typically exported to Germany and Austria, while the majority of sulphide portrait glassware found in America or England was manufactured in England. Lower quality imitations caused a decline in popularity.
Early production in Europe
The process for making a sulphide was developed in France by Barthélemy Desprez early in the 19th century. Originally a chemist at the French porcelain company Manufacture nationale de Sèvres, Desprez made the "finest sulphides". Desprez was employed at Sèvres from 1773 until 1783, and from 1786 to 1792. His job titles were modeler, chief modeler, and supervisor of the preparation of porcelain bodies. His son, Barthélemy Desprez Jr., was also involved with cameo portraits in glass. Another early French creator of sulphide portrait glassware, who also worked at one time at Sèvres, was the Chevalier de Saint-Amans (Pierre Honoré Boudon de Saint-Amans). Saint-Amans received a French patent in 1818 for improving (not creating) the process for encrusting cameos in glass. An 1850 report credits Saint-Amans with producing "marvels of artistic beauty". In England, ceramic portrait medallions made by Josiah Wedgwood created interest in the production of portraits encased in glass. Wedgwood was a potter who was one of the first to industrialize pottery manufacturing, and he was also credited with inventing modern marketing. Glassmaker Apsley Pellatt received an English patent for the sulphide process in 1819. His sulphides were typically medallions or paperweights. They could also be set in plaques of glass to be hung on a wall. Some sulphide portraits were added to the sides or the bottoms of glassware such as tumblers, beakers, and bottles. Pellatt's cameos consisted of china clay, sand, and potash that were cast in molds and then heated to a hardness so the clay mixture would withstand encasement in glass. The Pellatt family ran London's Falcon Glass Works, and it has been described as the "pre-eminent London glassmaking factory of the 19th century". Pellatt produced sulphide portrait glassware from the 1820s until the 1850s. He died in 1863.
Early production in the United States
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