Tiffany Studios

Robert Koch, Louis C. Tiffany: Rebel in Glass, New York, 1964, p. 173 (for a related example)
Alastair Duncan, Tiffany At Auction, New York, 1981, pp. 14 and 36 (for a related example)
Robert Koch, Louis C. Tiffany: The Collected Works of Robert Koch, Atglen, PA, 2001, pp. 104 and 307 (for a related example)
Alastair Duncan, Louis C. Tiffany: The Garden Museum Collection, Woodbridge, Suffolk, 2004, pp. 258-259 (for related examples)
Paul E. Doros, The Art Glass of Louis Comfort Tiffany, New York, 2013, frontispiece and p. 141 (for a related example)

This now-iconic motif first appeared in late 1913. Tiffany Furnaces had depicted morning glories in earlier paperweight vases, but those all had a heavy gold-orange interior iridescence. The glasshouse, however, decided to attempt a radical departure and totally eliminate any iridescence. This new design philosophy permitted the flowers to be the primary focal point, and the transparency of the glass added a greater three-dimensional aspect to the internal decoration.

According to Leslie Nash, who was the son of Arthur Nash, the glasshouse’s long-time superintendent, the company was experimenting with special formulas that created a glass that reacted and changed colors when struck with heat. Louis Tiffany, aware of these experiments, came to Tiffany Furnaces one Monday in October 1913 with a watercolor of morning glories he had recently painted. He showed the painting to Arthur Nash and insisted the glasshouse reproduce his painting in glass. After numerous failures, the gaffers finally succeeded by using five different types of reactive glass. Leslie Nash claimed the company spent $12,000 in materials and labor by the time the first successful “Morning Glory” paperweight vase was created. For this reason, they were priced at no less than $1000 each.

- Paul Doros