Blown glass ornaments are part of every Christmas tree decoration. Their diversity, elegance and uniqueness is something we all admire, but little do we know about the history of this element of Christmas decoration. That’s why we brought you the story about blown glass ornaments.
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Let’s find out more about this beautiful part of Christmas decorations, that fits perfectly to any kind of Christmas tree.
An Idea Behind Blown Glass Ornaments
When the Christmas decorations still was a new custom, people aimed to develop various methods of decorating Christmas trees with as much light as possible. They first used lighted candles, after that came actual electric Christmas lights, such as electric bulbs.
But people wanted to amplify a little bit more of sparkle and shimmer, that's why metallic tinsel and glass baubles became necessary part of decoration for the well-dressed Christmas tree. The idea of creating blown glass ornaments was a European invention and later became popular in the whole world.
Blown Glass Ornaments manufactured in Germany
Germany is the country that was first to add Christmas tree decoration as an important part of celebrating this holiday, furthermore it was the country that started the process of creating blown glass ornaments, that replaced edible German decoration such as apples, nuts and marzipan cake.
It all started in Central Germany, where families manufactured hand-blown glass ornaments.The tradition of glass-making was common in the town of Lauscha, where a lot of families did glass-making manufacture, back in the 1860s.
The Process of Creating Blown Glass Ornaments
In the typical glass-making families, the process of making a blown glass ornaments looked like this: the father with adult son blew glass tubingthat was heated over a Bunsen burner into ornament shapes. The other members of the family had the role of applying a silver nitrate solutionto the insides of the blown glass ornaments, in order to make them reflect light.
Then ornaments were left to dry overnight. After that, each blown glass ornament was dipped in brightly colored lacquerand decorated with paint of some kind of elegant attachment such as ribbon, spun glass, or feathers. The glass stem need to be cut, and a metal hanger was attached instead of it.
Different types of Christmas ornaments
The most common blown glass ornaments made by German families were balls and ovals, but by making plaster or metal molds into which the glass was blown, many other interesting shapes were made.
The most common ones were hunting horns, smokers’ pipes, elaboratebells, delicate vases, and little birds. The colors used for these early ornaments imitated those of the colored sugars used to decorate confectionery.
When Glass Ornaments Production Started in Other Countries?
The exclusive producer of glass ornaments until 1925 was Germany. With German immigrants, the tradition of manufacturing blown glass ornaments came to the United States. Soon enough this kind of ornaments became popular in America.
After Germany and the States, back in 1925, Japan was the next country to producesignificant quantities of ornaments. In Europe, the countries that had strong glass-making traditions were Czechoslovakia and Poland, and they entered the marketplace in the late 1920s.
Glass Ornaments Production in the United States
到 1935 年，美国进口了超过2.5 亿件手工饰品， 但仍然没有自己的产业。1939 年，在第二次世界大战开始时，欧洲被切断了玻璃饰品和许多其他欧洲进口产品的供应。那是纽约进入这个行业的时候。
生产始于1926年开发的彩带机。通过将这台机器改造成装饰品所需的玻璃形状，每分钟可生产2000多个装饰品球，每年可生产约1亿件装饰品。机器。
今天，玻璃饰品的批量生产也是如此。制作圣诞装饰品的另一种方法是手工吹制玻璃和专门设计的模具，因为它们已经制作了 100 多年。
这是一个关于吹制玻璃饰品的故事，它是每个圣诞节装饰品中不可替代的一部分。了解这一点，也许我们会更加欣赏挂在圣诞树上的闪闪发光、美得惊人的玻璃片的价值。
在Schmidt Christmas Market发现其他圣诞装饰品。
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