Cleveland Museum of Art

Daffodil Table Lamp

Tiffany Studios

Date

c. 1910–13

Medium

Leaded glass, blown glass, bronze

Culture

America

Department

Decorative Art and Design

Institution

Cleveland Museum of Art

In the 1870s a renewed emphasis on natural landscapes ushered in a generation of cottage gardeners who delighted in planting perennials in large quantities. Louis Comfort Tiffany was among those who championed the lush, sometimes wild-looking displays of varied floral species in the garden at his Long Island estate, Laurelton Hall. Tiffany encouraged his designers to take inspiration from his garden by shipping fresh cuttings almost weekly to his studios. Ohio native Clara Wolcott Driscoll and her team of female designers created floral patterns for lamps and mosaics based on the colorful blooms of spring that became among the most sought after and commercially successful of Tiffany’s production. Giant bronze crabs, likely cast from a real crustacean, set the scene for this rare Tiffany Studios base in which green glass is blown into a bronze cage—a very difficult technique since glass and bronze cool at different temperatures risking a complete shatter if not executed correctly.

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