Within the broader context of 18th century drinking
glasses there are certain areas which form the basis of specialist
collecting fields. One of these is Beilby glassware, a class mostly
of drinking glasses distinguished by painted white and coloured
enamel decoration produced over a short period around 1760.
The Beilby family of Newcastle: William, Richard and Mary were
all skilled glass decorators who learned how to fire enamels onto
glass and worked for different factories in the Newcastle area.
Their decorative repertoire ranged across various categories
from simple white enamel floral or avian motifs, painted around the
bowl of small cylindrical bowled wine or cordial glasses, via more
complex classical architectural vignettes to armorials in
polychrome enamels.
Their most complex works were the large glasses and decanters
made as special commissions for particular families or events such
a ship launch.
In terms of identification, a handful of pieces are signed but
most are attributed to the Beilbys on account of their style or
quality. While virtually all enamelled glassware of this type from
this period tends to be given a Beilby or Beilby-type attribution,
it seems unlikely that there were not other talented decorators of
the period who produced what was obviously a sought-after form of
painted drinking glass.
The James Giles workshop in London, another often-cited
attribution also produced enamelled glassware and there are
doubtless other workshops whose work is characterised as "Beilby
type" or "Beilby style" yet to be brought to full prominence.
For reasons of relative scarcity and the market shifts outlined
below, no Beilby glass can really be described as cheap.
Indeed, there is probably not enough Beilby glass out there for
enthusiasts to confine their collecting to this alone. Most
collectors are likely to have one or two glasses as part of a
larger drinking glass collection.
However, one or two particularly keen collectors like Chris
Crabtree and A.C. Hubbard
built up larger holdings that covered the entire output of styles
and forms, ensembles whose existence we know about because they
have come back to market for resale.
Entry-level buyers in this market will struggle to find much in
the three-figure bracket although mid-18th century
enamelled wine glasses featuring the types of motifs detailed above
that are described as 'Beilby type' are the most affordable.
Above: from the rare group of Beilby glasses with armorial
decoration, this trio painted in polychrome with arms for Thomas
impaling Clayton for John Thomas (1712-1793) a career churchman who
became Bishop of Rochester in 1774, sold for £16,000 at Stride and
Sons in Chichester in June 2011.
Drinking glasses make up the bulk of the Beilby output. The most
affordable glasses are simply decorated mid 18th century
wine glasses often set on an opaque twist stem and standing around
6-7in (16-18cm) high. These are the most readily available and
there is repertory of motifs that are frequently repeated, most
commonly fruiting vines or formal neo-classical swags around the
rim of the bowl.
These tend to be priced in the £1000-£3000 depending largely on
the amount of decoration.
More complex are the landscape vignettes often incorporating
architectural motifs and figures which are often derived from stock
print sources like The Ladies Amusement which were
also used for decoration on porcelain of the same period. Here the
price bracket moves up from around £2000-10,000.
As in every other field, established collectors want documentary
pieces that have a provenance so glasses whose decoration features
an armorial or inscription often set in rococo cartouches are the
most highly regarded. Just under 100 armorial goblets are known to
have survived, 16 of them signed.
It is a case in point that for the rarest pieces even a
substantial amount of damage or restoration is tolerated in the way
that it would not with a generic glass of the same period. The
polychromed goblet made for the Beilby-Thompson family of
Micklethwaite Grange, for example, which had lost its foot made
£13,000 in 2006 and following restoration increased that price to
£32,000 when it was auctioned four years later.
The performance of specialist fields like Beilby has diverged
dramatically from the more consistent general performance of the
market for 18th century drinking glasses.
Beilby prices have on the whole been on an upward trajectory for
several decades.
Readily available scholarship can often increase interest and
demand and the publication of James Rush's book The Ingenious
Beilbys in 1973 introduced this glassware to a much
wider audience in this country and the US, helping values to
climb.
Prices took a few dramatic leaps forward around the turn of the
21st century as collectors like Crabtree and Hubbard
competed to build up their collections, producing a string of
unprecedented auction highs.
A few years later, however, both these collectors turned vendor
unleashing quantities of top-dollar Beilby glass on the market. The
collecting air is always thinner at the top of the tree so with
supply outstripping demand, prices stagnated or even fell back a
little.
As in all fields, provenance and rarity still hold sway and if
one of the handful of signed special commissions come up these
market factors might still be over-ridden.
Values therefore have not fallen back to pre-1990s levels and
Beilby glass still performs well above pieces of equivalent date or
form without this distinctive decoration.
The Ingenious Beilbys by James Rush, Barrie &
Jenkins (1973), ISBN-13: 978-0214654121
The decorated glasses of William and Mary Beilby
1761-78 by James Rush, Laing Art Gallery (Newcastle, 1980),
ASIN: B004FO7I66
William Beilby and the Art of Glass by Simon Cottle,
The Glass Circle Journal 9 (2001), p31-40
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