Shinagawa glass

Flint glass made at the Shinagawa Glass Works
Only a small number of items produced at the glassworks at Shinagawa have been identified.

Brush holders made at Shinagawa about 1880
Brush holders, flint glass. Photograph courtesy of Tokyo National Museum

These two items were made under the instruction of James Speed, British glass craftsman at the Shinagawa Glass Works. They were displayed at Japan’s Second Industrial Exposition in 1881 in a group of 268 items made by the factory. These included domestic tableware, vases, stationaries, chimneys for lamps, bottles, glass for pharmaceutical or chemical use and red glass for ships’ navigation lights.

Pressed glass plate 14.6cm v.similar to fragment found Shinagawa
Pressed glass plate. 14.6cm. Photograph courtesy Kobe City Museum.

This pressed glass plate is very similar to a fragment of glass found at the site of the Shinagawa Glass Works and believed to have been made there.