Wednesday, June 30, 2010

Oh Me, Oh Milk Glass!

via In This Instance

My love for "Milk Glass" did not come about until around two years ago when my boyfriend and I were attempting to run an eBay store (Bohemian Bargains - temporarily closed until I build up more inventory). Anyway, his mother gave us a bunch of stuff that she had in boxes and no longer wanted - which included the majority of a pretty generous milk glass collection (along with lots of Precious Moments and Hummel figurines)! Wow, I was in love - at first sight! And no, I couldn't bare to sell it, so I kept it all! Hehe... It's better that way, I'm keeping it in the family.

Ever since then I've had a sharp keen eye for milk glass, and I have found a lot of it in Goodwill stores around town for as little as 25 cents! No lie! I know some milk glass might seem a little dated, but from the variety of pictures in this post that I've collected from the web I'm sure I can convince even the most modern-minded decoristas that milk glass is indeed classic and timeless, but it all depends on how it is used and displayed!

Some of you may not be familiar with milk glass and are probably wondering, what is it? When and where does it originate from? When was it first popular? First of all, according to that Wikipedia site, "Milk Glass" is a more recent popularized term for what was originally called "Opal Glass," characterized by its opaque or traditional milky white colored glass (for the record, I am going to call it milk glass). Milk glass was first made in 16th century Vernice, Italy and is "an opaque or translucent, milky white or colored glass, blown or pressed into a wide variety of shapes." - other colors include blue, pink, yellow, brown and black. Apparently milk glass pieces produced during the Gilded Age (post Civil War era of the late 19th century) is known for "delicacy and beauty," while the low cost translucent colored "Depression Glass" pieces of the the late 1930's and 1940's are "less so."

I love Depression Glass too, I just don't have too much of it. Anyway, I hope you enjoy this post and I hope you've gained a bit of appreciation for milk glass. Keep an eye out for it at garage sales, thrift shops, antique stores and especially Goodwills! I snag'em for between 25 cents and $1.50! I'd love to share photos of my milk glass pieces, but I haven't taken too many... what am I thinking!? I must do this soon and share them with you in a future post.

It's almost Friday!! Wheeeeeee!

via Molly and Mary

via In This Instance

via Cedarwood Weddings



Below is an amazing little idea from the blog Down and Out Chic for jewelry storage! Fortunately I have this exact piece of milk glass, so I'll be adding it to the beautiful chaos that is my dresser's jewelry strewn surface! I wish I had found this a while back so I could have included it in my post Random jewelry storage ideas that I love, but here it is....



Pink milk glass! I can't wait until I find one of these.....






via Christina via Ruffled

via Christina via Ruffled

For the full how-to on these cute little milk glass moss planters please visit the blog Ruffled.

via Christina via Ruffled


via The Flying Bee

Here is an example of another color, I'm pretty sure this is milk glass and not Depression glass, but either way it's so purty....


You might remember this one from my past blog post about creative succulent planters/displays..... so beautiful!

No comments:

Post a Comment