Tag: vintage reclaimed glass | Page 3

Salvaging Vintage Glass

Posted on February 9, 2015 by Sara

Ribbed chicken wire safety glass – just one of the many varieties available

In our environmentally conscious society today, architects, designers and builders are always looking for ways to incorporate sustainable building products in new projects. Besides interior and exterior building elements such as doors, mantels, hardware, building stones, fencing and reclaimed wood, OGT has now become the industry leader of not only these items, but also of a line of vintage safety glass.

Removed from industrial and commercial turn of the century buildings and structures, much of this safety glass is no longer manufactured, making it a highly sought after commodity in today’s design world where industrial chic is still holding its own.

NE PA Power Plant with 100 ft long skylight

Here you can see the careful removal of ribbed opaque chicken wire glass from what once was a skylight in a coal power plant in Northeast Pennsylvania. [ezcol_1half]

Meticulously removed and then stored and processed at our Scranton, PA location, this glass can be cut to order and shipped pretty much anywhere worldwide.

Visit our Olde Good Glass web site to see the various projects our customers have already completed using reclaimed vintage glass.

Cata: Silvered and Industrial Glass and Lighting

Posted on January 18, 2015 by Danica Sorber

Come inside Cata and see what a few refurbished salvaged items can do

Come inside Cata and see what a few refurbished items can do

In a world where it is considered such commonplace to “throw the baby out with the bath water” so to speak, it is a breath of fresh air when one can so masterfully find creative ways to employ otherwise overlooked items.

When you walk through the eclectic doors with reclaimed chicken wire glass, the arched set of antique silvered glass copper windows that is lit just behind the bar catches your eye right away, and you cannot help but be drawn to the copper pendant lights that float across the room overhead.

Thanks to OGT, Cata, an upscale restaurant on New York’s Lower East Side, was able to do just that. By artistically using refurbished décor, they were able to create a very unique ambiance for their patrons, proving that a good meal definitely begins with presentation! Of course, in a restaurant that boasts an ever-changing menu, and a schedule that is as unique as the flavor d’jour, one would expect nothing less.

The delicious brick exterior and reclaimed chicken wire glass in the doors and windows of the restaurant are two of its great vintage features

The distressed silvered glass behind the bar casts a glimmering reflection of Cata patrons as they dine in style

The different fixtures, all with different stories to tell, definitely contribute to the undeniable eclectic, yet swanky feel of this place. It is undoubtedly… unparalleled. This is definitely not something that can be replicated. It is not your run-of-the-mill, everyday décor, simply because these pieces cannot be picked up at your local Walmart. They are one of a kind.

Hanging fixtures add an industrial touch to an elegant space

Hanging pendant lights add an industrial touch in front of reclaimed chicken wire arched picture windows

Sometimes beautifully flawed for what they were originally intended, but repurposed and remade into something even greater. The beauty of this place is not unlike an inner-city church choir, although each individual piece by itself has its own innate beauty, it is only when they are all combined that you can truly appreciate its splendor.

Distressed mirrored glass
Reclaimed chicken wire glass

Which Came First: The Chicken or the Glass?

Posted on February 18, 2014 by Janet Chismar

Now that you have seen the many ways people use chicken wire glass, we thought it would be interesting to take a step back and look at the origins of this amazing product.

First, we need to start with chicken wire itself, which was invented in 1844 by British ironmonger Charles Barnard. The son of a farmer, Barnard wanted to help his father by finding a way to keep wayward chickens from fleeing the coop.

Inspired by the cloth-weaving machines common in his home town of Norwich, Barnard developed a way to manufacture a mesh fence out of thin, flexible galvanized steel wire twisted into hexagonal patterns.

The idea took off and a company was born. Barnard, Bishop & Barnard later produced and sold chain-link and other types of wire fencing internationally.

Chicken wire is used today to build cages for small animals or to protect plants from hungry squirrels and chipmunks. Creative people have adopted this versatile material in dozens of other clever ways, including making sculptures, baskets, picture frames and even chandeliers.

As for embedding chicken wire in glass, we need to go back to 1894. Coca Cola was sold in bottles for the first time and the Tower Bridge in London opened for traffic. What is the significance of these two facts to chicken wire glass? Glass-enclosed rooftops became trendy, raising concerns about breakage and safety.

But innovative glass manufacturers managed to come up with a solution. The Pilkington Group, headquartered in St. Helens, United Kingdom, was among the first to manufacture chicken wire glass that year.

The process consisted of sandwiching steel wire mesh between two separate ribbons of semi-molten glass and then passing “the sandwich” through a pair of metal rollers that squeezed the wire and glass together. The temperature at which the wire is embedded in the molten glass ensures cohesion between the metallic netting and the glass, and the two materials become as one.

This marriage creates a glass of extraordinary strength. A quarter-inch-thick piece is just as strong as a half-inch-thick piece of ordinary glass. It will not shatter like plate or skylight glass, thus it is often used for overhead work where falling shards would create danger.

In addition, chicken wire glass is a good fire retardant; the wire mesh keeps glass shards from falling, thereby preventing flames from spreading.

It is practically burglar-proof and missile proof, which is why you’ll see chicken wire glass used in schools, banks, museums, prisons, airports and jewelry shops. You can also find it in interior glass screens, partitions, balustrades, display windows and showcases.

Beyond its practical safety benefits, chicken wire glass is valued for its beauty. Chicken wire glass can be made with a maize-like design, ribbed, rough-rolled or as a clear polished plate. Dimensions vary. A piece can be 1/4, 3/8 or 1/2-inch thick, up to 40 inches wide, and up to 100 inches long. The wire is so thoroughly covered that rust or corrosion are highly unlikely.

Additionally, this type of glass intercepts 99 percent or more of incoming ultraviolet rays, protecting furniture near windows from discoloration caused by exposure to direct sunlight. If you don’t like shutters, this is the glass for you. It also provides good sound insulation.

If you feel like chicken…

If you’re interested in incorporating chicken wire glass in your renovation or building project, check out our inventory here. And lots more info on our specialized glass site.

Create a Custom Look with Chicken Wire Glass

Posted on January 8, 2014 by Janet Chismar

From coastal California homes to Pulino’s restaurant in the Bowery district of Manhattan, vintage chicken wire glass is being used as a design element in a number of creative and unique ways.

Originally manufactured to provide durability, stability, and security to industrial or commercial buildings such as schools and fire stations, this industrial-grade glass has a network of wire molded into it, making it strong and shatter-resistant.

In addition, the variety of netting shapes and glass textures make the chicken wire a versatile design choice, especially if you want to evoke a nostalgic feel or country theme in your home. Choose from clear, textured, pebbled or hammered glass and a wormy, square or hexagonal netting design.

Savvy homeowners are using this glass in almost every room of the house. Whether your style is Country French, Classic White or Modern/Industrial, you can create a one-of-a-kind custom kitchen using chicken wire glass. Show off your crystal or copper cookware by replacing solid cupboard doors with glass. Design an open and airy pantry with chicken wire glass doors. The effect works well on curio hutches and china cabinets in the dining room too.

starbucks2Carry the look into the living room, family room or office. Protect your books, TV, stereo equipment and keepsake decorative items by using chicken wire glass doors on your shelves. The wine cellar is a natural for this beautiful glass.

And think about adding chicken wire glass doors to the cabinet above the bathroom toilet.

To let light into your home while sustaining privacy, consider using chicken wire glass on your French doors or skylights. This type of glass is a sturdy and wise choice for patio or balcony enclosures. We’ve even seen a vintage barn that incorporated chicken wire glass doors.

On the commercial side, Starbucks in New York City uses chicken wire glass panels as space dividers. Cata Restaurant in Manhattan’s Lower East Side features a patchwork of chicken wire glass textures in their exterior windows, while The Arlington Club on the Upper East Side has an atrium skylight and soffit above the bar made with pebbled chicken wire glass.

The Acqua Al 2 restaurant in Washington, D.C., uses hammered chicken wire glass to cover storage areas. Its casement windows are also made from a patchwork of chicken wire glass of various textures.

One Manhattan apartment created a canopy with salvaged corrugated chicken wire glass, while the Diane von Fustenburg showroom designed an unusual awning with corrugated chicken wire glass retrieved from the Philadelphia Naval yard.

Ready to try some in your next renovation or building project? Olde Good Things carries a wide variety of vintage chicken wire glass: clear, pebbled, hammered, ribbed, wormy square, aqua pebbled or textured. We can cut your order to size. A cutting fee may be applicable depending on the order size. Samples are available upon request.

Things to know about ordering vintage glass:

• The wire twists in chicken wire glass run top to bottom, the direction of the height. When requesting a quote please provide your dimensions as width x height.
• With all our glass products, we can do cut-outs, drill holes and cut to your template patterns. Templates must be provided in a rigged material.
• All our glass is reclaimed vintage material, and most have been used, so expect signs of age from exposure to weather and use.
• Minimum order $300.
Samples are available.

Design Dream! A Spectacular Home Redesign with Antique and Vintage Goods

Posted on June 3, 2013 by Danica Sorber

Olde Good Things has been mentioned in a recent pictorial feature in Design NJ, New Jersey’s Home & Design Magazine. This pictorial featured the incredibly beautiful designs of Linda Maley and Lisa Keyser, sisters and owners of Whitepop Design. Whitepop Design has the distinction of being featured in several NJ design magazines, showcases, and having the opportunity to design homes for people all over the East Coast.

The magazine pictorial featuring OGT was a great pat on the back for the expertise of Whitepop Designs in integrating architectural salvage into existing interiors.

Here is our commentary on the pictorial featuring photo highlights of Olde Good Things’ salvaged goods.

Vintage items bring warmth and grandeur that can’t be paralleled by new renditions of old things. The most important aspect of antiquing is knowing how to collect the showpiece items and learning to bypass the items that lend a sense of untrendy grandma-ness to space. Classic old pieces are worth the investment as they bring depth and crumble the common platitude of modern factory recreations of style. At Olde Good Things, you will find treasures like the old church railing that recalls the grandeur of the Gothic era. To truly repurpose something may involve giving it a previously inconceivable function. The use of the railing as a truss adds swooping lines to entry for a great room making it something more than the sum of its parts.

The beautiful dark wood railings, overhanging decorative supports, and breathtaking stained glass windows were carefully salvaged by OGT from a Gothic church.

An up close and personal view of the eye catching stained glass windows and salvage Gothic church railings.

This is another glorious view of the salvaged dark wood Gothic church railings that have been repurposed as faux support beams.

Walk into the room and find salvaged stained glass windows that echo a distant past. The house dons a grace and elegance from the past that has been brought to life through its salvaged parts. For the full impact of a thoroughly made-over house, the antique wainscoting and solid wood wall paneling mimics the lines from the Gothic railings and windows and fireplace. Coming together like the final crescendo in an orchestral piece of full-bodied sound, the full grace of antique French doors leads to a sense of awe and silence fitting of a quiet, old lounge vaguely bedecked with musty cigar smoke and conversations lulling on fire lit nights.

The breathtaking Gothic dark wood paneling and wainscoting caressing the length of this hallway is a prize OGT was more than happy to award with this remodeling project.

These amazingly detailed hand-painted windows were imported from Argentina and lovingly handled by OGT until they found their forever home in this place of honor in the kitchen.

Entirely possessed with a seemingly impossible cozy grandeur, the home is a complete relic of the past brought to full life in a present-day setting through the art of Olde Good Things’ style and unique sense of perfection. A stark contrast to any cluttered antique store, the style, and elegance in this home resonate through each piece salvaged from locations around the world. Argentine charm comes together with pieces so reminiscent of an old church, they seem to vibrate with tunes of old hymns sung in a capella resonance and the final rattle of a distant subway station in New York comes through in the kitchen tiles perched auspiciously beneath an ornately carved wooden hood for the stove and beautiful wooden ceilings that bring the entire picture into focus.

These gorgeous French doors and hand painted transom were salvaged and imported from Argentina. Just another of the incredible pieces OGT has been privileged enough to obtain.

Very much alive, the past comes to complete and final harmony with the present in each room throughout the home. Each item is beautifully showcased to perfection. Rich with stories and beautiful lives of their own, the antique pieces dwell somewhere in the liminal between time leaving their audience to wonder at their splendor and giving a whole new life to the walls of the home. Few walls require an entire audience to marvel at them, but those with their hand-painted Argentine windows and ornately carved wooden panels, are quite something else. Made by hands from another time, the pieces evoke a kind of passion and stillness within the heart of the beholder.

If walls could speak, these would have more to tell than any modern re-fabricated attempt at reproduction and would be well worth several afternoons of hot tea and conversation. As for the present caretakers of the items, they live a life surrounded by reminders of the past and beauty of eras gone by. Perhaps in harkening back, it becomes possible to also look forward and imagine hallowed silences and moments of importance passing again before these very walls before they continue their journey and become part of new stories.

Subway tile

Argentine Glass

The photos in this post were taken from Design NJ, New Jersey’s Home & Design Magazine, February/March 2013 edition. Thank you!

Design NJ, February/March 2013

Design Dream! A Spectacular Home Redesign with Antique and Vintage Goods

Posted on June 3, 2013 by Danica Sorber

The magazine pictorial featuring OGT was a great pat on back for the expertise of Whitepop Designs in integrating architectural salvage into existing interiors.

Here is our commentary on the pictorial featuring photo highlights of Olde Good Things’ salvaged goods.

Vintage items bring a warmth and grandeur that can’t be paralleled by new renditions of old things. The most important aspect of antiquing is knowing how to collect the showpiece items and learning to bypass the items that lend a sense of untrendy grandma-ness to a space. Classic old pieces are worth the investment as they bring depth and crumble the common platitude of modern factory recreations of style. At Olde Good Things, you will find treasures like the old church railing that recalls the grandeur of the Gothic era. To truly repurpose something may involve giving it a previously inconceivable function. The use of the railing as a truss adds swooping lines to an entry for a great room making it something more than the sum of its parts.

The beautiful dark wood railings, overhanging decorative supports, and breathtaking stained glass windows were carefully salvaged by OGT from a Gothic church.

An up close and personal view of the eye catching stained glass windows and salvage Gothic church railings.

This is another glorious view of the salvaged dark wood Gothic church railings that have been repurposed as faux support beams.

Walk into the room and find salvaged stained glass windows that echo a distant past. The house dons a grace and elegance from the past that has been brought to life through its salvaged parts. For the full impact of a thoroughly made-over house, the antique wainscoting and solid wooden wall paneling mimics the lines from the Gothic railings and windows and fireplace. Coming together like the final crescendo in an orchestral piece of full-bodied sound, the full grace of antique French doors leads to a sense of awe and silence fitting of a quiet, old lounge vaguely bedecked with musty cigar smoke and conversations lulling on fire lit nights.

The breathtaking Gothic dark wood paneling and wainscoting caressing the length of this hallway is a prize OGT was more than happy to award with this remodeling project.

These amazingly detailed hand painted windows were imported from Argentina and lovingly handled by OGT until they found their forever home in this place of honor in the kitchen.

Entirely possessed with a seemingly impossible cozy grandeur, the home is a complete relic of the past brought to full life in a present day setting through the art of Olde Good Things’ style and unique sense of perfection. A stark contrast to any cluttered antique store, the style and elegance in this home resonate through each piece salvaged from locations around the world. Argentine charm comes together with pieces so reminiscent of an old church, they seem to vibrate with tunes of old hymns sung in a capella resonance and the final rattle of a distant subway station in New York comes through in the kitchen tiles perched auspiciously beneath an ornately carved wooden hood for the stove and beautiful wooden ceilings that bring the entire picture into focus.

These gorgeous French doors and hand painted transom were salvaged and imported from Argentina. Just another of the incredible pieces OGT has been privileged enough to obtain.

Very much alive, the past comes to a complete and final harmony with the present in each room throughout the home. Each item is beautifully showcased to perfection. Rich with stories and beautiful lives of their own, the antique pieces dwell somewhere in the liminals between time leaving their audience to wonder at their splendor and giving a whole new life to the walls of the home. Few walls require an entire audience to marvel at them, but these with their hand painted Argentine windows and ornately carved wooden panels, are quite something else. Made by hands from another time, the pieces evoke a kind of passion and stillness within the heart of the beholder.

Subway tile

Argentine Glass

The photos in this post were taken from Design NJ, New Jersey’s Home & Design Magazine, February/March 2013 edition. Thank you!

Design NJ, February/March 2013

Vintage Artistic Glass Turned Statement Piece

Posted on February 12, 2012 by ogtadmin

JFK American Airlines terminal window glass

Every now and then we have a chance to work with something that is not just old and beautiful, but that also has significant historic ties to the community. The Robert Sowers Window, which is a famous abstract mosaic originally belonging to the American Airlines Terminal 8 – was designed by Robert Sowers and debuted at the Idlewild Airport (now known as the John F Kennedy airport) in New York in 1960.

More commonly known as the “Cathedral,” this beautiful piece has been a beacon of beauty and light to the community for decades. When the time came for it to retire, not only were we called upon to do the dismantling of this beautiful piece, but we also were also able to salvage some of it for our customers, as seen above. We have many glass panels still available; see some of the inventory here. Read more about the Sowers window here.

We love the strong, heavy antique horse paired with the elegant, delicate doors and windows in the picture above – what do you think of it?

The Pump

Posted on May 3, 2009 by ogtadmin

If you live in New York City, or if you’re just a health food fanatic, then you may have heard of The Pump Energy Foods. With several locations across the city, they are growing and recently opened a store at the corner of Pine & Pearl.

[Read more…]

Entrancing Entrance

Posted on April 28, 2009 by ogtadmin

The before image

Five years ago there was a set of doors that was removed from a structure in a South American city. The doors were placed in a cargo container and transported over sea and rail for several weeks until they finally arrived at our warehouse in Scranton. Here they were removed from the container, dusted off, and photographed before being slid between other doors of similar size and stature, and left in storage for the time. The photographs were posted on our web store.

There these doors stood, over crowded and unappreciated, for many months. The shadows of passing customers would cast onto the frame, light would bounce from admiring faces that would only walk on to leave the magnificent portal untouched. Until finally, near the eve of Christmas, 2006, a returning customer was browsing our web store and caught a glimpse of a thumbnail, and decided to purchase the entryway.

Front door installed

[Read more…]

Olde Good Things In the Movies, Part 1

Posted on April 26, 2009 by ogtadmin

Here’s the first installment of what we hope to be a continuing series, Olde Good Things in the movies. The set above is from the 2004 movie The Forgotten (with Julianne Moore). The clock face is originally from the Shamokin (Pa.) clock tower (which had a unique history of its own, see also here and here).

The glass panels are actually corrugated with embedded chicken wire, reclaimed from industrial buildings and manufacturing plants. No longer manufactured, we’re the only remaining source of this glass, as far as we know. It’s also been used successfully in canopies as well as vertical walls and room dividers.

Also olde good things are the wooden table with industrial base (one of our specialties) and the wooden shelves in the background.

Help & info

Locations

Our Company

Follow us

Resources

Get Olde Good News