Worshipful Company of Glass Sellers

The Worshipful Company of Glass Sellers and Looking-Glass Makers of London

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The Worshipful Company of Glass Sellers and Looking-Glass Makers is one of the Livery Companies of the City of London.

The Worshipful Company of Glass Sellers and Looking-Glass Makers of London received its Royal Charter from King Charles II in 1664. Initially founded to regulate the Glass Selling and Pot-Making industries within the City of London, and to ensure quality and fair trade. To that end aspiring traders in glass were apprenticed to a master who was a member of the Glass Sellers Company. He in turn was accountable to the court and officers of the Livery and ultimately to The Master of the Company. Today the role of the livery company is to:

• Maintain cordial relationships within the Company, the City and the wider glass industry
• Stimulate interest in glass in all its aspects
• Carry out charitable works, with special emphasis on education
• Maintain the Company's traditions, values and customs
• Provide pastoral care for members in distress
• Support the Lord Mayor & the Corporation of the City of London

The tradition of integrity, generosity and fellowship that governed the company in former times remains today and creates an unbroken link with the past. Representatives of almost all the sectors of the modern glass industry are members of the Livery. These include the manufacture and sale of container glass, medical glass, art glass and the Telecommunications, Media and Technology sector.

The Company actively promotes the use of glass in arts, crafts, science and technology, and supports education and training in all these areas.

History

The Worshipful Company of Glass-Sellers and Looking-Glass Makers of London ranks 71st in precedence amongst the City’s Livery Companies and received its incorporated Charter in 1664. This, together with an earlier Charter dated 1635 which was not incorporated by the Alderman’s Court, for reasons which are now obscure, are both still held by the Company. The 1630s were troubled times and problems in the glass trade periodically collided with a background of political unrest.

Within the City of London there already were Livery Companies controlling the manufacture and quality of glazing for windows and spectacle manufacture; and the new Glass Sellers Company was therefore established to cover all other parts of the glass trade. It was to be responsible not only for the production of drinking vessels and tableware, but also the manufacture of looking-glasses and glass vials – such as those then used in the making of hour glasses.

The main task of the new Company, all of whose members were previously members of other London Companies, was dominated by retailers – often those working with china, which was then imported from China in large-scale lots for sale to retailers at auction.

Trade Background

The British glass industry is much larger than many realise. It is worth many billions of pounds annually. Glass is possibly the most malleable of substances; it can be fashioned into shapes and used for more purposes than any other material.

• We melt it in the flame of a match but it can stand the heat of re-entry into the Earth’s atmosphere
• We look through it, when we look though windows, windscreens and lenses
• We look at it when we admire stained and art glass
• We put things in it when we fill milk bottles and lead crystal wine glasses
• We use it to communicate via fibre optic cables which transmit data signals, and in the manufacture of satellites
• We use it in surface engineering in the manufacture of cars and air craft and also in the biomedical industry.

Glass touches every aspect of our daily lives. It is a truly “green” substance. It is made from natural materials in abundant supply and can be recycled back to more or less its natural state with little or no loss of performance.

Charitable activities

The purpose of the Worshipful Company of Glass Sellers Charity Fund is to support:

• The wider glass industry
• The City and its specific appeals
• Education
• The less privileged in and around the City of London

Charitable activities include:

• Awards e.g. the Glass Sellers' Art and Craft and Science and Technology prizes
• Scholarships and bursaries for education
• Glass in Society projects with schools throughout the country
• One off gifts in response to specific appeals including the Lord Mayor’s Charity

The Glass Sellers' Art & Craft Award

Working under the patronage of the Worshipful Company of Glass Sellers, George Ravenscroft made his famous discovery of lead crystal glass. Its manufacture subsequently began in 1674 on the site now occupied by the Savoy Hotel in the Strand. Since then the Glass Sellers Company has continued, in various ways to support the art of glassmaking, consolidating this in the main, in two awards for Glass Art. The Glass Sellers Prize used to be an annual award but since 2008 has been linked to the British Glass Biennale and is awarded biennially.

The Worshipful Company of Glass Sellers works in association with the British Glass Biennale to offer The Glass Sellers Art & Craft Award and the Glass Sellers Art & Craft Student Award.

www.glass-sellers.co.uk