Blenko Hand Crafted Asymmetrical Glass Bowl

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Blenko Hand Crafted Asymmetrical Glass Bowl

About the Item

Hand crafted asymmetrical citrine art glass handled bowl. Signed on base "Blenko", circa. 1960s. Darker color on base is reflection of wood table. Citrine color is even throughout bowl. Blenko Glass In London on December 8th, 1854 William John Blenko was born to a working class English family. William became interested in glass adornment at an early age, and being encouraged by his mother apprenticed himself to a glass craftsman. He attended school and became a pupil of philosopher John Tyndall. Early in the 1880s he went into business for himself making what is known as rondels (Round Window Panes), while experimenting with other processes of making glass superior to his competitors. At the age of 38, he came to New York to experiment with the wonder fuel natural gas. Hearing that this fuel was abundant around Kokomo, IN he went there and started up one of Americas first gas-fueled operations. The year was 1893, he was producing glass but it would not sell. The American window makers would not accept his products, although it was made by Old World methods. There was a natural prejudice against a domestically made glass. The stained glass studios were European and wanted European glass. He encountered a recession and being discouraged by this he decided to return to England and export the same product he was making in Indiana. He came back to Indiana in 1899 and started a trans-Atlantic shuttle that would end in Milton, WV 23 years later. He chose the little farm town of Milton because the Industrial Development Dept of the Chesapeake & Ohio Railroad sold him on the idea of Milton as a good place to work. It was a dependable source of sober, industrious labor and natural gas, used in all the glass furnaces, was cheaply priced. In the spring of 1921 William arrived in Milton where he soon began unloading the tools of his trade into a small hillside barn. He then went to work building a furnace, with the help of a newly recruited crew of locals. Within a few weeks, handmade glass was being manufactured. 2 years later in 1923 he set up shop at our present location, where we strive to continue this time-honored tradition. In 1925, William H. Blenko and his wife Marion (daughter of Henry Hunt of Hunt Stained Glass Studios in Pittsburgh, PA) came to Milton to help his father in the day to day operations of the factory. Needing still larger production areas and better shipping facilities, the Blenko works moved to their present location near the main line of the C&O Railroad across the river from Milton. During the depression era William became aware that there would be a need to expand the product line to more than just stained glass. So in 1929, he secured the services of two Swedish Glass Craftsmen. They trained the Blenko crews to craft beautiful pieces of glass by hand. Production increased and in 1930, the company changed from Eureka to Blenko Glass Company, and so came the tableware line of glass products that have made “Blenko” a household name all over the world. Source: Blenko Glass

Creator:
Blenko Glass (Maker)
Dimensions:
Height: 4 in (10.16 cm)Width: 9 in (22.86 cm)Depth: 5.75 in (14.61 cm)
Style:
Mid-Century Modern (Of the Period)
Materials and Techniques:
Glass,Hand-Crafted
Place of Origin:
United States
Period:
Mid-20th Century
Date of Manufacture:
1960s
Condition:
Seller Location:
Fulton, CA
Reference Number:
Seller: K18F1stDibs: LU945912575751

Shop All Blenko Glass

Blenko Glass

A producer of hand-blown glass since 1893, Blenko Glass is currently headquartered in Milton, West Virginia, where it has operated since 1921. Among its many illustrious projects are the stained-glass windows it produced for St. Patrick’s Cathedral and the Washington National Cathedral. Blenko is known today for the brilliant colors of its glass vessels and objects—particularly those produced in the 1950s and ’60s—which range from jewel-like blues and greens to brilliant reds and yellows.

The company was founded by William J. Blenko, an English immigrant who was apprenticed to a glassmaker in his native London as a young man. Blenko developed expertise in the production of rondels, the round panes used in stained glass windows. His interest in the potential of natural gas to fire glass furnaces led him to Milton, where abundant reserves of the fuel had attracted a pool of skilled glassblowers. Under the name Eureka Glass, his company began making window glass in 1923, and in 1925, he was joined in the business by his son, William H. Blenko.

When the Great Depression quelled demand for stained glass, William J. Blenko brought local Milton glassblowers into the company to begin producing stem- and tableware, products for which the company, which changed its name to Blenko in 1930, is now best known. Up until the end of World War II, Blenko’s tableware designs were fairly straightforward, and they sold well at American department such as Gump’s, in San Francisco. The company was also commissioned in 1930 to produce a line of reproductions for Colonial Williamsburg.

In 1947, the company hired as its art director Winslow Anderson, who introduced artful, fanciful and modern vessels and objects in vibrant colors. This began what collectors refer to as Blenko’s “historic period.” A number of Anderson’s designs were honored by the Museum of Modern Art’s Good Design Awards in 1950, and throughout the 1950’s and ‘60s, the company enjoyed robust sales and critical acclaim. The forms Blenko produced during this period followed the contemporary vogue for biomorphism, or organic modernism, which favored rounded and fluid shapes inspired by nature.

One of Blenko’s most influential designers, Wayne Husted, who was active from 1953 to ’63, is credited with aligning Blenko’s products with the prevailing mid-century modern aesthetic by pushing the envelope on both form and color, particularly in his wedge-cut and Spool decanters and his Echoes series. Joel Philip Myers, who designed for Blenko in the 1960s, brought a sense of whimsy and visual excess to the product line, in keeping with the psychedelic look favored during the period.

Blenko Glass still produces many of its classic designs in items ranging from stemware and tableware to decorative objects and ornamental decanters. Among collectors, pieces created under Husted’s creative direction are of special interest. The company has come to the attention of younger audiences through the documentaries Blenko: Hearts of Glass and Blenko Retro: Three Designers of American Glass, both of which aired on PBS. Blenko also designed the glass award trophy for the Country Music Awards.