Station: [43] Sulphide Paperweight

Sprecher

The „paperweight with green painted frog, “ was possibly produced in Silesia between 1900 and 1925. Flowers and animal motifs were some of the most popular and therefore not particularly rare motifs from this time. This paperweight however is still a very rare example among „sulphide paperweights,“ and this green painted frog makes a paperweight collectors’ heart beat faster. Today only very few of these very natural painted sulphide figures remain.

Sprecherin

These figures enclosed in the glass are made of a highly heat- resistant mass or paste similar to porcelain, which is fired after modelling. Glassmakers either used one or two-piece moulds to make the motifs, or they modelled them freehand. A very thin film of air bubbles usually formed around the figures when they were melted into the glass and you can see this as a silvery shine. Sulphide paperweights were mainly made in Thuringia, Bohemia and Silesia.