Why does Tiffany glass look so different from other kinds of colored glass?
Were the lamps designed to use electricity? Were they expensive when new? The answers to these and other questions encourage an even greater appreciation of Tiffany’s brilliant lamps and other works. Who was Louis Comfort Tiffany? Born in 1848, he was the elder son of Charles Lewis Tiffany, founder of the famed Fifth Avenue Tiffany and Company. L.C. Tiffany was a painter, interior designer, collector, world traveler, photographer, manufacturer, and avid gardener. By the early 1880s, Tiffany was recognized as a highly successful interior decorator, executing prestigious commissions at the White House and the Veterans’ Room of the Seventh Regiment Armory in New York City. This was followed by the establishment of the glass companies that would make him world famous. He was first married in 1872, became the father of three children, was widowed, and remarried in 1886. Active and supportive of the arts for his entire life, Tiffany died at age 85 believing that his reputation as “the first
