I was driving up to Rhode Island for the Newport Jazz Festival, and got off the highway to get some lunch near Clinton, Connecticut. But before I got a bite to eat, I found my attention pulled into the parking lot of the Key to the Past Antique Center. There were a lot of interesting things, but this one really caught my eye: it was described as a “vintage Czech Art Deco End of Day Glass Lamp Shade.”
There’s no doubt it would be a conversation starter as a lamp shade, although it’s not so much a shade as it is a glass geometric shape that would fully cover the light bulb, from what I can tell. But then there’s the question that I had, which is: what is “end of day glass?” I had never heard of that before.
End of Day Glass, which also might be called “spatter glass,” is a technique that has been used for several centuries, and according to one online source, dates back to the Romans. And while artisans in several countries have produced End of Day glass pieces, the most commonly found source is of Czech origin. The End of Day or Spatter technique is achieved by rolling hot blown glass over small pieces or chips of colored glass. It was often a technique that glassworkers might utilize at the end of the day (hence the name), as it allowed them to use up the remaining pieces of molten glass in the pots from their various projects.
As it is with many cool things that I see in antique stores, I wish I had bought it, just because it’s such a unique piece, but it cost a bit more than I was ready to spend for an impulse purchase. But it did introduce me to a new artistic concept, and perhaps I’ll keep an eye out for other End of Day Glass pieces in the future.