Lisa Ackerman’s Holiday Cheers from Orange, CA

Merry Christmas, circa 1968! Yes this is a vintage Empire Plastic blown mold plastic snowman! I even found the original directions inside of Frosty!

Marie McKee, Kiki Smith & Max Ehrlacher

Tattoo Vase embodies many of the things that make Steuben pieces great. The shape is an iconic vase shape, the glass is the beautiful clear crystal for which Steuben is known, and the engraving is classic Steuben, so deep in some places and skillfully done. Kiki worked with Steuben engraver Max Erlacher, who is enormously talented, to accomplish this work. I feel proud of the teamwork and effort that it represents.

Henry Ford’s Black

I had thought that three of my pieces, a #367 compote (green, marked ‘Hawkes,’ and pictured on the website), a vase that has the ribbing akin to that of #366 vase, page 250 in Gardner, but is shaped more like #358 but slant- sided rather than bulbous, and a low fan vase, were all what I think of as Hawkes green. Both of the latter two are marked with Steuben fleur de lis, but as neither has a line drawing, neither is on the web site (unless Marshall Ketchum parked them under some number I have yet to view). I believe this darker, more forest green, was used by both Hawkes and Steuben only for the years when Carder supplied blanks to Hawkes.

If you go through the line drawings, ##357 to 366, all the website line drawings show the items made in ‘green.’ It is not Pomona, but just ‘green.’ For some time, I had thought that the term ‘antique’ green ought to apply – until it was determined that what had been passing for, and denominated as ‘blue-gray,’ was, in fact, ‘antique green.’ Now I am back to thinking of my three pieces as “Hawkes green,’ or just plain ‘green,’ for it is a hue that disappears at about the time Carder stopped supplying Hawkes, and strikes out on his own. If we assume that production rate was about 300 numbers added each year, I don’t know that this color is found in any Steuben production, perhaps after 1905 or so. By then,and thereafter, any greens had names of their own, and the Hawkes green (sometimes bearing the Hawkes mark; sometimes the Steuben) is no longer in production. Gardner lists all the greens (p.60), but simple ‘green’ is not one of them. Of course, when production started, there was no need to have differentiating names. (Sort of like Henry Ford’s options – you could have any color car, so long as it was black.) I wouldn’t be surprised that the first blue, red, and yellow (probably all among the three digit numbers in the line drawings) were without specific names. When did ‘blue,’ for example, become, or become different from, ‘celeste blue?’

As always, thanks for keeping interesting topics on the Gazelle.

David Chadwick-Brown, San Diego