Glacial Beauty

Glass manufacturer J. & L. Lobmeyr’s limited-edition “collectible of the year” is Viennese designer Sebastian Menschhorn’s take on the more artistic qualities of a glacier. A chunk of hand-blown crystal is carved with a cutting stone until no curved surface remains, the edges and facets conjuring up the imagined memory of Arctic ice. “The idea is to cut out of the glass like an ice cube,” Leonid Rath, a managing partner of Lobmeyr, explains. The vase is brushed rather than polished, leaving an ice-like surface rather than the clearer polished crystal most expensive vases favor. “Glass is such a different material,” Rath continues, explaining why the designer chose to highlight slightly different qualities with this design. The eight-inch vase weighs twenty-two pounds, which could explain why only 181, costing about $2950, have been produced.