Historically, the most common form of glass. It contains three major compounds in varying proportions, but usually silica (about 60-75 percent), soda (12-18 percent), and lime (5-12 percent). Soda-lime glasses are relatively light, and upon heating, they remain plastic and workable over a wide range of temperatures. They lend themselves, therefore, to elaborate manipulative techniques.

A mold with the same shape as the desired object, usually a vessel. Flat glass blanks are made into vessels by sagging them over or into former molds.

The process of reheating a blank until it becomes soft and gradually flows under its own weight over or into a former mold and eventually assumes the shape of the mold. Soda-lime glass becomes soft at about 1110°F (600°C). Slumping is also known as sagging.

The process of reheating a blank until it becomes soft and gradually flows under its own weight over or into a former mold and eventually assumes the shape of the mold. Soda-lime glass becomes soft at about 1110°F (600°C). Slumping is also known as sagging.

Any cooled glass object that requires further forming or decoration to be finished.

Sodium carbonate. Soda (or alternatively potash) is commonly used as the alkali ingredient of glass. It serves as a flux to reduce the fusion point of the silica when the batch is melted.

Calcined limestone, which, added to batch in small quantities, gives stability. Before the 17th century, when its beneficial effects became known, lime was introduced fortuitously as an impurity in the raw materials. The addition of insufficient lime can cause crizzling.

A form used for shaping and/ or decorating molten glass. Some molds (e.g., dip molds) impart a pattern to the parison, which is then withdrawn, and blown and tooled to the desired shape and size; other molds (sometimes known as full-size molds) are used to give the object its final form, with or without decoration. Dip molds consist of a single part and are usually shaped like beakers. Full-size molds usually have two or more parts and can be opened to extract the object. Nowadays, most molds are made of metal, but stone, wood, plaster, and earthenware molds were used in the past and are still occasionally employed today.

Glass that is colored by (1) impurities in the basic ingredients in the batch or (2) techniques of coloring glass by one of three main processes: (a) using a dissolved metallic oxide to impart a color throughout, (b) forming a dispersion of some substance in a colloidal state, and (c) suspending particles of pigments to form opaque colors.

A vitreous substance made of finely powdered glass colored with metallic oxide and suspended in an oily medium for ease of application with a brush. The medium burns away during firing in a low-temperature muffle kiln (about 965°-1300°F or 500°-700°C). Sometimes, several firings are required to fuse the different colors of an elaborately enameled object.

Colored glass, often deep blue glass colored with cobalt oxide. Smalts are finely ground to use as colorants for glass and enamel.

A strand of glass, roughly circular in section, drawn out from a gather.

In glassmaking, a soluble salt consisting mainly of potassium carbonate or sodium carbonate. It is one of the essential ingredients of glass, generally accounting for about 15-20 percent of the batch. The alkali is a flux, which reduces the melting point of the major constituent of glass, silica.

Potassium carbonate. It is an alternative to soda as a source of alkali in the manufacture of glass.

Silicon dioxide, a mineral that is the main ingredient of glass. The most common form of silica used in glassmaking has always been sand.

The mixture of raw materials (often silica, soda or potash, and lime) that is melted in a pot or tank to make glass. Cullet, as well as minor ingredients such as colorants, can be added to the batch to help the melting process.

A substance that lowers the melting temperature of another substance. For example, a flux is added to the batch in order to facilitate the fusing of the silica. Fluxes are also added to enamels in order to lower their fusion point to below that of the glass body to which they are to be applied. Potash and soda are fluxes.

Susceptible to being modeled or shaped. When it is in a molten state, glass can be described as plastic.

An iron or steel tube, usually four to five feet long, for blowing glass. Blowpipes have a mouthpiece at one end and are usually fitted at the other end with a metal ring that helps to retain the gather.

The pontil, or punty, is a solid metal rod that is usually tipped with a wad of hot glass, then applied to the base of a vessel to hold it during manufacture. It often leaves an irregular or ring-shaped scar on the base when removed. This is called the “pontil mark.”

Any instrument used by glassworkers to develop and shape an object. Glassworkers’ tools include the blowpipe, pontil, gathering iron, jacks, shears, clapper, pallet, block, pincers, battledore, lipper, and crimper.