2019.11.19 Tuesday Stretch

Cal here. Greetings and welcome to a smoky, stretchy Tuesday evening. Dave Shetlar paid us a visit this past weekend and we had some fun taking photos of stretch glass. He made sure to photograph some Imperial Blue Ice aka smoke stretch glass so I could share it with you tonight. “Blue Ice” is the color name Imperial gave their stretch glass which has become known as ‘smoke.’ I personally prefer to use the OMNs whenever we know them, so I’ll generally refer to this color as “Blue Ice” but for tonight, it will be smoke!

We have seen some Imperial smooth vases on previous nights, but I thought I would share this photo of a group of vases in various sizes. The big one is really big and IMHO qualifies as a funeral vase. It has a base diameter of 5 3/8” and is 16 1/4” tall and 9” at the widest point at the top. Note the differences in the finishes on the various vases and the resulting colors.

Imperial made Chesterfield in this color as well. I have 5 of the tumblers (thank you, Tom Burns) and a 6th one does exist but is owned by someone else. Note the variation in the color of the two tumblers in the photo. I am not aware of a pitcher, but one must have been made since we have tumblers. Where there is smoke there is fire and where there are tumblers there is certainly a pitcher. Maybe one of our readers has a pitcher and will send in a photo. Needless to say, I’m on the hunt for the pitcher.

Here are a couple pair of candleholders by Imperial. I only recently acquired this first pair; the second ones I have apparently had for some time, according to my inventory #. Double Scroll console sets are also available in smoke as shown here.

I’ve only managed to acquire 2 shapes of the Floral & Optic bowls in smoke; another one recently sold in an auction (Seeck, I believe) but the price advanced multiple times in the closing minutes of the auction and I thought it best to let the other bidder win that one since they seem very interested in getting it. Note that the two flared bowls have different finishes; one is very stretchy and one is very shiny. We understand from Imperial ads that they offered these and some other pieces in both finishes, so the two finishes are deliberate not accidental.

Finally, here is the typical wide panel bowl but in the less-typical “normal” shape, i.e. as it came out of the mold without any reshaping. I don’t want to take up the entire discussion tonight so I will stop here for now. I will try to send in additional photos of a few more examples of smoke stretch glass on another night. Thanks for looking, hopefully the smoke didn’t get in your eyes.