Busacca Gallery

Consolidated Glass, Amber Color Glass Bowl 3 ¼" x 8 ¾" Cast and frosted yellow glass bowl depicting batched with fruits and foliage, smooth polished interior. No marks found. Condition: Good. Well-Executed American Arts and craft Consolidated Glass Honey-Colored. Beautifully textured ovoid body divided by clear glass arcs creating foliate relief reserves. Glass molded with blossoms.

Link: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Early_American_molded_glass

The process of blowing molten glass into a mold made of clay is known to have been employed in Syrian workshops as early as the 4th century BCE. Romans adopted the technique in the 1st century CE. Molds used in 19th-century European and American glass factories were cast in iron or bronze.[8] They were made by professional mold manufacturers in many large United States cities and were universally available. Although no intact molds have been found, fragments of molds have been excavated at glass manufacturing sites in Sandwich, Massachusetts and Kent and Mantua, Ohio.



The mold, which was placed on the floor or below floor level, was not three molds, but one mold in three parts. It was made of hinged sections that could be opened and closed by means of a foot or hand operated treadle. One of the vertical walls of the mold was permanently fastened to the base and the other walls were attached to it by removable pins. Designs were cut into the inside walls of all mold parts. Some molds impressed a pattern on the object and base, while others omitted the base. Most molds were in three parts, but could also be constructed of two or four parts. Regardless of the number of parts of a mold, all objects produced in a mold are called three-mold glass.



The process of molding was just the initial step in the manufacture of three-mold glass. After removal from the mold, the glass was expanded by means of additional blowing. The object was then cracked off at the rim and hand finished by grinding and polishing. Pitcher rims, decanter necks and bases all required hand work. In New England, pieces were often finished with threaded lips. Handles were also added after removal from the mold. Lamps, candlesticks and vases were pressed in separate parts and fused together while still hot. Finished pieces were fire polished by reheating in the furnace, which softened the pattern and gave the piece a diffuse brilliance.



Between 1820 and 1840, one hundred glass factories are known to have been in operation in the U.S. It is known from descriptions in advertisements and invoices that the Boston and Sandwich Glass Company and the New England Glass Company were major producers of blown three-mold glass. Most colorless glass was made by the New England Glass Company in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Also producing three-mold glass in New England was the Boston Crown Glass Manufactory, as well as the Quincy Glass Works in Massachusetts, which made snuff bottles molded to a square form. Three-piece molds were used from 1815 to 1835 in midwestern houses, most notably in Ohio. Marlboro Street Factory in Keene, NH manufactured dark green and amber bottle glass and was known for the manufacture of inkwells. In New York and New Jersey, famous glass manufacturers of blown three-mold glass include the Mount Vernon Glass Company, Brooklyn Flint Glass Works, and Jersey City Glassworks. The Coventry, CT Glass Company was also a manufacturer of three-mold items. It is believed that glass factories in Pittsburgh, Philadelphia and Baltimore also produced three-mold glassware, but since excavation is not possible, no proof exists. Some foreign molded three-part glass manufactured in England, Ireland (two part molds) and France (three part molds) in the early 19th century, is sometimes mistaken for American glass.