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Vintage Christmas Ornaments
 
Can anyone give me reference information or online websites that explain how to tell the vintage German and Czech blown glass ornaments apart from the new ones?
 
 
-I don't know of any. Old glass ornaments look so different from the new ones I've never had any trouble telling them apart. Look at any of the high-priced Radko ornaments, for example. The colors are bright and brassy. Too perfect for me. Here is a scanner-bed full of old ornaments I yanked from my collection this morning: http://www.diadem.com/gifs/september/ornaments.jpg The snowman's missing the back of his head (mob hit, maybe?). Part of the charm of the old ornaments is that as they've aged, in places they've become transparent. That parakeet ornament (with the cap that isn't original, BTW) is like that, very pale pastels. One quick way to determine relative age is that if the cap looks like it belongs to the ornament and the hanging loop is dull grey (lead), then it's an older ornament. -The new "pickle" ornaments are pearly-green, while the old ones I've seen are truer-green and not pearly. http://www.jablonex.cz/christms.htm (Note: look at cap sizes, may be small!) No images here, just descriptions: http://offthedeepend.com/flamin10p.html Other: http://www.oingo.com/topic/246/246349.html http://www.bohemiancrystal.com/page52.htm -I had understood at one point (or maybe misunderstood) that the old Kugel ornaments had been reproduced and there was some way to tell by the tops of them whether they were old or not.
 

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