Pirelli Glass was famous for creating light-hearted lampwork glass animals of all shapes and sizes.
The designs were lauded for being imaginative, humorous and highly collectable.
Pirelli also made the Guinness glass animals, with pints of Guinness on their backs. The most famous one was the glass Ostrich that had swallowed its pint of Guinness. It can be seen in the original Guinness advertisement.
In the beginning, they were making the glass animals themselves. The main glassworkers were William Michael Dunlop, Edward H C Maugham and Edward Robbins in 1948, with William listed as a glassmaker, jig and pattern maker.
Based in Potters Bar, Hertfordshire the company was founded in 1945 by Robert George Dunlop, who went by the name George.
The plan was to make glass giftware and lampwork animals, but they later switched to being resellers only
Dunlop had trained as a scientific glassmaker and started Pirelli with his wife, son and John Henry Hollingdale.
Pirelli Glass was a subsidiary of Glass Industries Ltd and Hertford China, of which Hollingdale and Dunlop were also directors. Another director was Charles Caplin.
According to company documents, there was a whole web of interweaving companies. It appears that these were used to raise money by business bank loans and mortgages. The complexity of the overlapping companies enabled Dunlop and Hollingdale to manipulate the figures which was a common practice among English firms.
Oakmere Glass Limited was a wholly owned subsidiary of Pirelli Glass and was the sole agent of Babycham Glasses. The glasses were decorated at Nazeing Glass in Essex and Vasart Glass in Scotland.
Company activities were listed as“the manufacture and distribution of glassware, pottery and fancy goods” but the company’s paperwork was full of holes and omissions so it is hard to tell exactly what was going on.
In 1949, Dunlop made contact with Ysart Glass as he wanted to be a reseller of their beautiful glass paperweights. He also wanted to commission the company to make glass giftware pieces for Pirelli Glass to sell.
It was George who helped Vincent Ysart set up Vasart Glass Limited with his father Salvador and brother Augustin. The three of them had left Moncrieff to set up Ysart Brothers Glass, which traded as Vasart Glass. Salvador’s son Paul remained at Moncrieff.
By the mid-fifties, with Salvador and Augustin having passed, Vincent began to lose heart in Vasart Glass, which was struggling to make ends meet.
George would travel up to Scotland in his Lanchester Limousine to collect Vasart paperweights and vases. Sometimes, things were so bad for Vincent that the “well-heeled” George would have to write a cheque for the glassworkers’ wages to keep the firm afloat.
You can read more about the early history of Yart Glass here
In 1956, George stepped in as partner and the traditional Vasart Glass acid-etched signatures were replaced with paper labels. A silver and black paper label was put on some Vasart pieces that said ‘Pirelli Glass Hand Made in Scotland.’
George and J H Hollingdale set up a company in Scotland with George’s son Brian, Graham R Wurzel and Charles Caplin called Pirelli Glass (Scotland) Limited but it was never used and was struck off the company register in 1979.
In one particular half-page advert in the Pottery Gazette and Glass Trade Review, Vincent can be seen working on a vase and Pirelli Glass is mentioned in the same advert, as well as a London showroom at Dorann House, 37 Sloane Street, London SW. Therefore, it is clear that there was a lot of financial crossover between the two companies.
Dunlop was also connected with Strathearn Glass and perhaps was managing director in 1977
One of the designers at Monart Glass, Isobel Moncrieff (who married John) was nee Dunlop, but not sure if there is a connection there. If anyone knows more information, please email me details so I can update the article.
When Pirelli Glass wound up in 1983 and went into liquidation in 1985. The delay in the liquidation process was because of objections raised by some of the creditors. The business was listed as glass and china wholesalers and retailers, by the liquidators. It had been going for 40 years.
Sources:
https://glassencyclopedia.com/pirelliglass.html
https://www.ysartglass.com
https://glasszoo.info/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lady_Marianne_Isobel_Moncrieff
Further Reading
Pirelli Glass: Book 2 by Angela M Bowey and Bob Martin – BUY IT HERE
London Lampworkers: Pirelli, Bimini and Komaromy Glass: Book 1 by Angela M Bowey, Bob Martin,, Christine Burley and Raymond Berger. – BUY IT HERE