Advances in glass making technology in the early eighteen century led to the widespread production of cut-glass and lead crystal chandeliers. Glittering crystal chandeliers do not necessarily require the formal setting of grand reception rooms as crystal chandeliers can be just as much at home in an uncluttered contemporary interior.
Chandelier Glossary
Adam style
A neoclassical style, light, airy and elegant chandelier - usually English.
Arm
The light-bearing part of a chandelier also sometimes know as a branch.
Arm Plate
The metal or wooden block placed on the stem, into which the arms slot.
Bag
A bag of crystal drops formed by strings hanging from a circular frame and looped back into the centre underneath, associated especially with early American crystal and regency style crystal chandeliers.
Baluster
A turned wood or moulded stem forming the axis of a chandelier, with alternating narrow and bulbous parts of varying widths.
Bead
A glass drop with a hole drilled right through.
Bobeche
A dish fitted just below the candle nozzle, designed to catch drips of wax. Also know as a drip pan.
Branch
Another name for the light-bearing part of a chandelier also know as an arm.
Candelabra
Not to be confused with chandeliers, candelabras are candlesticks, usually branched, designed to stand on tables, or if large, the floor.
Candlebeam
A cross made form two wooden beams with one or more cups and prickets at each end for securing candles.
Candle nozzle
The small cup into which the end of the candle is slotted
Canopy
An inverted shallow dish at the top of a chandelier from which festoons of beads are often suspended, lending a flourish to the top of the fitting.
Cage
An arrangement where the central stem supporting arms and decorations is replaced by a metal structure leaving the centre clear for candles and further embellishments.
Corona
Another term for crown-style chandelier
Crown
A circular chandelier reminiscent of a crown, usually of gilded metal or brass, and often with upstanding decorative elements.
Crystal
Glass with a lead content that gives it special qualities of clarity, resonance and softness – making it especially suitable for cutting. Also know as lead crystal.
Drip Pan
The dish fitted just below the candle nozzle, designed to catch drips of wax. Know also as a bobeche.
Drop
A small piece of glass usually cut into one of many shapes and drilled at one end so that it can be hung from the chandelier with a brass pin. A chain drop is drilled at both ends so that a series can be hung together to form a necklace or festoon.
Dutch
Also known as Flemish, a style of brass chandelier with a bulbous baluster and arms curving down around a low hung ball.
Festoon
An arrangement of glass drops or beads draped and hung across or down a glass chandelier, or sometimes a piece of solid glass shaped into a swag. Also known as a garland.
Finial
The final flourish at the very bottom of the stem. Some Venetian glass chandeliers have little finials hanging from glass rings on the arms.
Hoop
A circular metal support for arms, usually on a regency-styles or other chandelier with glass pieces. Also know as a ring
Moulded
The process by which a glass piece is shaped by being blown into a mould (rather than being cut)
Neoclassical Style Chandelier
Glass chandelier featuring many delicate arms, spires and strings of beads.
Prism
A straight, many sided drop
Regency Style Chandelier
A larger chandelier with a multitude of drops. Above a hoop rise strings of beads that diminish in size and attach at the top to form a canopy. A bag, with concentric rings of pointed glass, forms a waterfall beneath. The stem is usually completely hidden.
Soda Glass
A type of glass used typically in Venetian glass chandeliers. Soda glass remains “plastic” for longer when heated, and can therefore be shaped into elegancy curving leaves and flowers.
Spire
A tall spike of glass, round in section or flat sided. To which arms and decorative elements may be attached, made form wood, metal or glass.
Tent
A tent shaped structure on the upper part of a glass chandelier where necklaces of drops attach at the top to a canopy and at the bottom to a larger ring.
Venetian
A glass from the island of Murano, Venice but usually used to describe any chandelier in Venetian style.
Waterfall
Concentric rings of icicle drops suspended beneath the hoop or plate. |
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