Description of Paperweights

Paperweights are classified by size as well as decoration.

Size - Abbreviations for dimensions of the paperweights in this book are: D (diameter), H (height), L (length), and W (width). There are three standard traditional sizes:

Miniature - any paperweight less than 5 cm (2 in.) in diameter. Common - any paperweight about 7 cm (2¾ in.) in diameter. Magnum - any paperweight more than 8.5 cm (3⅜ in.) in diameter.

Decoration - The a special vocabulary used by experts to describe and identify paperweights.

Cane - a prepared rod of glass with either glass spiraling 'threads' on its surface (see Filigree) or an enclosed pattern that runs its full length and is visible only when seen in a cross-section. Rods must be reduced to a size suitable for a paperweight. The process begins at the furnace: a glassmaker dips the end of his pontil rod (see Pontil) into a tank of molten glass and collects a gather of glass. An assistant attaches a second pontil rod to the opposite end of the gather. They draw it (pull it) out in opposite directions, thereby reducing its diameter to the required size. The drawn-out rods are then cooled (annealed) and broken into sections. At this point, with direct heat, these rods can be manipulated to form flowers or figures (see Flamework).

To make a simple millefiori cane (see Millefiori), the drawn-out colored glass rods are bundled into the required pattern. The bundled canes are reheated and attached to a pontil rod with a gather. A second pontil rod is again attached and the bundle is drawn out to reduce the diameter of the bundle without destroying the internal pattern. The resulting millefiori cane is cooled and broken into short manageable lengths, which are arranged with others to create the paperweight design. This is then heated and covered with a colorless glass dome and base.

Canework - decoration using cane sections. Canework began with simple canes as decorative additions on ancient Egyptian perfume containers, but really flourished under the Roman Empire. Made for the wealthy, small millefiori bowls, gaming pieces, and highly decorative slices of caned floral inlay for furniture have survived to show later generations the high level of excellence that the Roman glassmakers achieved with this art. After the fall of Rome, the art was rediscovered in the late 15th century by the Renaissance glassmakers of Venice and Murano. They used canework as a staple for objects such as drinking glasses and footed dishes. These in turn inspired the glassmakers of the Netherlands to produce elaborate canework stems on tall drinking glasses. The Dutch glassmakers could only approximate the Murano canes as their glass was made with a potash flux (see Flux) rather than a soda flux, which was used by the Venetians and the Romans.

Carpet ground - tightly packed millefiori canes set randomly or in concentric circles, thereby producing a consistent pattern or color and giving the appearance of a carpet.

Checker or barber's pole-white twisted filigree segments set in a checkerboard pattern around spaced canes. Twisted filigree segments that include red and green or, more often, blue with the white canes are called 'barber's pole' because they look like striped barber's poles.

Crimp - a rose-shaped metal tool used to push a glob of colored glass up into the clear glass, to make a flower or other object.

Cut-base - base of paperweight with wheel-cut decoration. The most common cut-base decorations are stars (hence, star-cut base) or 'strawberry diamond' cutting (a fine checkerboard pattern).

Faceting - a method of decorating whereby an abrasive wheel removes circular or oval slices from the glass dome of the paperweight, leaving flat or slightly concave facets, called printies (see Printies). Larger facets on overlays (see Overlay) are called windows.

Filigree - a colorless glass rod within white or colored spiraling glass threads.

Flashing - a thin layer of translucent colored glass.

Flamework(formerly called lampwork) - the creation of realistic three-dimensional objects by manipulating melted glass rods over a flame. Its origins date back to at least 500 BC. Phoenician glassmakers from the eastern end of the Mediterranean Sea made small glass human heads, possibly for use as jewelry. Diminutive vases and perfume containers were also formed by this method.

Flamework died out with the fall of the Roman empire and almost vanished during the Middle Ages, but reappeared as a flourishing industry in Nevers, France, in the I600s. Large complex groups of glass figures in the form of gods and goddesses were fashioned for the dessert table while biblical figures were used for private devotion. Many of the figures were made by members of the Saroldi family, glassmakers from the Italian town of Altare, who came to France with Ludovico Gonzaga, later Duke of Nevers, when he married Henrietta of Cleves.

By the mid-1800s, British glassmakers embraced flamework to produce astounding confections protected by glass domes.

Examples from the 20th century include those hundreds of thousands of glass animals produced by glass artists at fairs and street corners whom American playwright Tennessee Williams immortalized in The Glass Menagerie.

Canadian 20th-century examples include the I960s flamework of Elmore Hookway (1889-1974) and the perfume bottles by Alexander Kapran (1954-2006). Both artists are worthy successors to the glassmakers of Nevers.

Flux - a chemical compound used to lower the melting point of silica (sand, which is about 75 per cent of the composition of glass) from about 1850° C to about 1300° C, an easier temperature to maintain. The flux can be soda (sodium carbonate), as used by the Venetians; potash (potassium carbonate), as used by the northern Europeans; or lead oxide, which was introduced in England by George Ravenscroft about 1676.

Millefiori (Italian, meaning 'thousand flowers')- decoration consisting of cross-sections of bundled solid glass rods (canes) placed together to create the impression of a field or carpet of flowers.

Muslin - white scrambled (see Scrambled) filigree canes that resemble the white cotton fabric called muslin.

Overlay - a paperweight encased within one or more thin outer layers of glass (thicker than flashing and usually opaque), then cut with printies or windows to reveal the inside.

Pontil (also called 'puntee' or 'punty') - the long solid iron rod onto which a partially made molten glass object is transferred. When the object is finished and removed from the rod, a rough pontil mark remains.

Pontil mark - the rough mark at the center of the bottom of a paperweight or other blown-glass object where the pontil was attached during the creation of the object. The mark can be smoothed out by reheating the glass surface or by grinding it after the object has been cooled (annealed) to room temperature.

Printie - circular or oval facet or window, several of which may be cut into the sides of the glass dome of a paperweight.

Scrambled - a haphazard arrangement of short broken sections of glass canes.

Torsade - a ring of twisted opaque white or colored glass encircling a mushroom or upright bouquet.