Tiffany Studios

American, 1902 - 1932

Geographic RegionLong Island, New York

BiographyLouis C. Tiffany and Tiffany Studios

As one of the leading tastemakers of the Gilded Age, Louis C. Tiffany (1848-1933) played a critical role in the development of decoration and design in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The son of the founder of Tiffany & Company, Charles Lewis Tiffany (1812-1902), the luxury retailer renowned for jewelry and silver, the younger Tiffany was exposed to the firm’s highly organized workshops and showrooms filled with the finest decorative objects from around the world. This undoubtedly stimulated his appreciation for fine craftsmanship and innovative design, which became the hallmark of his celebrated Tiffany Studios. Although he might have followed his father into an established and successful business, Tiffany pursued his own creative path of innovation and design, largely defined by his contributions to the field of glass, particularly that of leaded lamps and windows. Initially devoted to painting landscapes and exotic scenes from his travel abroad, Tiffany’s interests quickly expanded in the 1880s into interior design and the decorative arts. He formed artistic firms in Manhattan and Queens where, under his direction, hundreds of artists and artisans created extraordinary leaded-glass windows, lamps, mosaics, glassware, enamels, ceramics, metalwork, jewelry, furniture and textiles.

Tiffany established the first iteration of his firm in 1885, intent on pursuing production with new methods of glass making, namely, the use of opalescent glass. By the early 1890s, his attention was largely focused on the creative potential of glass. He tried working with existing glasshouses but became eager to take control of the artistic process and experiment on his own. Opalescent glass utilized properties inherent in glassmaking to make colored and textures sheets of glass that could then be cut into pieces and reassembled. This was done in lieu of the Gothic technique of painting and staining glass and was intended to create a more pictorial result. While Tiffany, as well as John LaFarge, promoted the opalescent picture approach to glass others such as Charles Connick followed the more traditional approach, seeking to adhere to ideas central to the philosophy of the Arts and Crafts movement, namely reviving historic methods of working with leaded glass. Tiffany’s aesthetic incorporated the use of the leading (previously only an element of construction) as part of the design and considered nature to be the central core of design inspiration. Also inspired by color, he sought to translate the natural world into glass and by the 1890s was exploring this objective through blown objects, windows and importantly, lamps.

Tiffany functioned as the owner and artistic director of what would grow to be a complex series of companies. An understanding of the company’s structure is complicated by the fact that there is no existing archive for the firm. Histories known today that include various aspects of the firm’s production as well as individual stories have been pieced together by scholars over the past 90 years. The vast enterprise operated under a variety of names. The setup of the company – as seen by the variation in names alone – was dynamic, evolving as need arose to grow and transition to a new area of production. Tiffany required a vast array of artisans, designers, and craftspersons to realize his vision. Many of these people were recognized and given credit for work done in press release and company brochures although work was produced under “personal direction of the direction of Tiffany” (as described in official materials).

Some individuals that worked for Tiffany have been studied more extensively in recent decades for their major contributions, including Frederick Wilson (1858-1932), head of the ecclesiastical department and Clara Driscoll (1861-1944), who ran the women’s department and is the designer of the Lotus Lamp. One of the longest lasting company names, Tiffany Studios, is used most often in twenty-first century publications to refer generally to the company. Company names include: Louis C. Tiffany and Company, Associated Artists (1881-83) (joint venture); Louis C. Tiffany & Company (1878-85); Tiffany Glass Company (1885-92); Tiffany Glass and Decorating Company (1892-1900); Allied Arts (1900-1902); Tiffany Studios (1902-32); Stourbridge Glass Company (1893-1902) (production support); Tiffany Furnaces, Inc. (1902-20) (production support); Louis C. Tiffany Furnaces, Inc. (1920-28) (production support).

Tiffany’s success was due to expansive creativity but also financial backing, primarily from his father, which kept the business running when experimentation and artistic pursuits were a priority and did not meet with market success. Despite the sometimes lack of financial success, there was tremendous recognition in the marketplace for Tiffany’s wares, especially for the ecclesiastical windows and lamps. These were of the highest caliber in terms of design, innovation, and craftsmanship and the cost reflected this. Tiffany’s reputation was bolstered by association with his father’s firm (at world’s fairs Tiffany Studios exhibited by/near Tiffany & Company). Many of Tiffany’s clients were wealthy, socially prominent families seeking unique decorative schemes and objects for their lavish homes. Commissions included the White House during President Chester A. Arthur’s administration, the New York City mansion of sugar magnate Henry O. Havemeyer and the Connecticut home of author Mark Twain. Tiffany also decorated stately public buildings and houses of worship across America. During his more than fifty-year career, he exhibited widely and participated in eleven world’s fairs, where he and his firms won an unprecedented number of awards for innovative designs. He received international attention for his efforts and sold work through Siegfried Bing’s L’Art Nouveau gallery in Paris. His promoted donation of his works to museums such as the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Smithsonian American Art as early as the mid-1890s, ensuring a prominent position in important U.S. public collections and helping him become one of the most celebrated artists of his time. Eventually, changing tastes and a declining economy contributed to the demise of Tiffany’s artistic empire. Production wound down during the 1920s. After Tiffany’s death in 1933 the company did not last much longer, closing permanently in the late 1930s.

[Some excerpts from Neustadt Collection of Tiffany Glass]

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