Standard Encyclopedia of Opalescent Glass by Bill Edwards, Mike Carwile (2004, Hardcover)

This fifth edition of the STANDARD ENCYCLOPEDIA OF OPALESCENT GLASS is outstanding -- it is currently the best general guide to early American Opalescent glass. Edwards & Carwile's regularly updated STANDARD ENCYCLOPEDIA guides to various kinds of glassware are all characterized by a drive to include new pieces, add information and correct small errors from one edition to the next. Glass collectors are lucky to have these guides; in the glass collectors' world, no other series is as comprehensive in its scope. This is my favorite of Edwards & Carwile's Standard Encylopedia volumes, because the STANDARD ENCYCLOPEDIA OF OPALESCENT GLASS provides dates of manufacture for almost every piece, important information often omitted from field guides about carnival, pressed and opalescent glass.

American companies that produced early opalescent glass were numerous and often short-lived, and thus THE STANDARD ENCYLOPEDIA OF OPALESCENT GLASS, 5th ed., borrows on an impressive breadth of knowledge about many different glass works. The book's preface features short histories of 18 opalescent glass producers. In addition to 206 pages of information on early glass, the book also includes a 20-page section on post-1930 opalescent glass that is very helpful to any buyer trying to distinguish common opalescent glass reproductions from true old glass -- and also to lovers of newer opalescent glass searching for names and manufacture dates of mid-19th Century opalescent patterns. Identifying opalescent pieces is made easier by the high quality of the color photography of the 5th edition. An appendix provides book values for all pieces covered.

We do have three minor questions about this edition of the SEOG. (1) We wonder whether the vases shown under the entry for Imperial's opalescent Ripple vases are misidentified as originals -- we think they might be reproductions. (2) Jefferson's Inverted Chevron and Fenton's Plume Panels opalescent vases are identified as two patterns, but this may be an error -- it seems likely that these are two names ascribed to the same pattern. Finally, (3) this edition attributes Plain Panels vases to Northwood; however, early Butler Brothers advertisements affirm that this vase pattern is a product of the Dugan Glass Company.

[ADDED NOTE: This book is published 2005 by Collector Books; 270 pages total, with color photographs; large format - 9 x 11 inches.]

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