Glass Bottles Jars Vessels

I think colored glass bottles and jars that line a shelf are always so pretty. Even when I see them at a flea market there is something so beautiful about it. All the different shapes, the curves, the history of them, what were they used for. Martha Stewart Living magazine has a great article on colored glass bottles in the August Issue. Greens, yellows, blues, amethysts, goldenrod, amber, aquas, deep teal.  There is even a category called Cathedral Pickle, a plain bottle sometimes with Gothic designs.  Each shape is made specifically for a certain purpose, its contents, to protect medicine, keep spirits fresh or warn the user that the bottle may contain poison. Cobalt or green glass bottles were used for arsenic to kill vermin in the Victorian Era.  Next time you see a colored bottle you may wonder what was it's purpose.

   

The color here is called bottle glass green, this glass is the most unadulterated.

     

Natural glass has an aqua tint as seen above in the bottle glass green jars.  Until 1900 there was a chemical used to change the color. The chemical that was used would turn the glass lavender when it was exposed to the sun.

  The largest one in this picture, the demijohn, was used for wine or ale dates back to the 1700's.

 My own piece of amber glass. This bottle I picked up in Sydney. It is used for ginger beer by Bundaberg Brewed Drinks