The Reifschlager Gallery at The Rockwell Museum-pre 2000

The name of this very rare type of Carder Steuben was suggested by it subtle overtones of purple, which reminded Carder of the color of he imperial purple fabrics that were the fame of ancient Tyre.

Tyrian is an opaque glass, which is exceptional for Steuben. The quality of the shading from green to bluish purple was governed by the heat treatment at the fire. When the glass was first gathered from the pot it was green, and it would remain green in color if worked directly from the glass pot without reheating. The purple color was developed by reheating the partially formed object in the glory hole under oxidizing conditions. The longer the glass was reheated, the deeper the pruple coloring became. Carder preferred the pieces in which the greenish-turquois top shaded to a purple base.

Tyrian pieces were usually decorated with applied Gold Aurene leaves and trailed threads, which were smoothed to the level of the glass. These Aurene decorations were, as usual, sprayed with stannous chloride to give them their iridescence and to give the Tyrian glass it characteristic sheen, especially in the areas around the decorations. A few vases have a hooked decoration of Aurene around the neck, superimposed on white and rubbed smooth with the glass surface. A few pieces have part of the trailed threading in relief. A relatively small number of Tyrian pieces were produced, all made about 1916.

abstracted from The Glass of Frederick Carder by Paul v. Gardner

Other Tyrian Examples