Vintage Joe St Clair Hand Blown Art Glass Icepick Flower Paperweight 3"

Description

Vintage Joe St Clair handblown art glass paperweight featuring an icepick floral motif circa 1960-1970. As is typical of this style, there is a carefully placed bubble in the center of each flower and also a carefully placed bubble in the ground in between each flower. It is hot stamped on the bottom.

This style of flower is called an ice-pick flower because of the ice-pick like tool used to push each flower down to the ground to form a stem.

The St. Clair line (as far as paperweights are concerned) started with John "Pop" St. Clair, Sr. who worked at the George MacBeth Glass Works in Elwood from around 1903 to 1938. Local natural gas production faltered in 1938 and the St. Clairs began to develop their ideas for a new business of their own. Joe St. Clair (1909 - 1987) did the original experimentation and the business was formally started in 1941 in Elwood, Indiana. John, Sr. and the brothers John, Jr., Joe, Ed and Bob all participated, while another brother, Paul, did not at first. By 1944 St. Clair paperweights were being sold through Georg Jensen on Fifth Avenue in New York. Joe retired (the first time) in 1971 and sold the factory to new owners in Elwood, Indiana. About the same time, Bob St. Clair and his wife Maude opened a new factory in Elwood. Paul St. Clair retired from General Motors and joined Bob, along with Ed St. Clair and a nephew, Joe Rice. Sometime later after Bob opened his factory, the new owners of the original factory sold the factory back to Joe. So, for a while, there were two St. Clair Glass factories. Bob St. Clair died in 1986. Joe St. Clair died in 1987. Ed St. Clair died in 1989 and the last brother, Paul St. Clair died in 2000.

Condition

Very Good

Dimensions

3” x 2” (Diameter x Height)