Corning’s reputation for glass spans the realm of science and technology, as well as the world of art, making it one of the most unusual meccas for glass in the world.

Even as the small glass company grew over the decades, gradually rising to prominence as one of the world’s premiere glass innovators, Corning also found itself home to some of the world’s most exceptional glass artists.

One of the first revered artists to be associated with Corning Glass actually made the trek with the Houghtons from Brooklyn to Corning back in 1868.

John Hoare

John Hoare, who already had a cutting shop in the city, set up the first cutting shop in Corning. At one time, around the turn of the 20th century, there would be twenty glass cutting shops helping earn Corning the name “America’s Crystal City.”

In 1870, Hoare named Thomas Gibbons Hawkes foreman of the cutting shop in Corning. President Ulysses S. Grant is said to have ordered glassware from Hoare for the White House in the early 1870s.

In 1876, a terrible fire struck Corning Glass and J. Hoare and Company which was located on the second floor of the Glass Works at the time. The fire destroyed about $20,000 worth of Hoare’s cut glass stock (today that would be worth almost half-a-million dollars).

TG Hawkes

Hawkes came over from Ireland to Brooklyn when he was seventeen-years-old and worked for John Hoare until he started his own cutting shop in Corning above Lavasso Field’s Marble Works in 1880.

Later, he’d move down Market Street where you can still find a sign on the historic building (you’ll also find contemporary glass artists working at Vitrix Hot Glass).   

Less than a decade after establishing his own shop, Hawkes helped establish American cut glass on the world stage by winning three grand prizes at the 1889 Paris Exposition. Over time, T.G. Hawkes & Co. became the largest cutting shop in the area. With a reputation for quality glass, Hawkes glassware was used in the White House for over fifty years.

Hawkes also also convinced an Englishman, Frederick Carder, to move here and help him start Steuben Glass.

Frederick Carder

Working at his father’s poetry shop from a young age, Frederick Carder became curious about glass after visiting a museum in London. At night, he studied art, chemistry, electricity, metals. Then he got a job making art glass, purchased his own small furnace, and set about experimenting, not just with designs, but in developing formulas to create glass in all sorts of colors.

Carder was eventually sent by his community to Austria and Germany to study glassmaking and report back. Then they sent him to America where he visited glassmakers in NYC, Pittsburgh, and Washington, DC, before making his way to Corning.

In the early 1900s, Steuben Cut Glass Company started making exquisite luxury crystal in the astonishing iridescent colors Carder had created, like Gold Aurene and Blue Aurene which you can see on display at the Corning Museum of Glass or for sale at the Erlacher Glass Shop in Home Again on Market Street.

Steuben Glass

Though first known for its lustrous, iridescent, colored glass, Steuben transitioned in the early 1930s to the brilliant clear crystal for which it has become internationally renowned. In 1940, Steuben established a tradition for collaboration with distinguished designers, architects, poets, and artists like Matisse, O’Keeffe, Noguchi, Dali, and others.

In 2008, Steuben was acquired by another company, and three years later production ceased, but in 2012 Corning Incorporated breathed new life into this iconic brand, buying back the name and turning the reins over to The Corning Museum of Glass to oversee sales and production of Steuben which is once again being made right here where it belongs in America’s Crystal City.

Max Erlacher

Born in Austria, the late Max Erlacher had become a master engraver with a growing reputation by his early twenties. At 24, he came to Corning to work for world-renowned Steuben Glass where he created one-of-a-kind pieces for world leaders, European royalty, and American Presidents including the official wedding gift from President and Mrs. Regan to Prince Charles and Lady Diana Spencer, a special PT109 piece for President John F. Kennedy, even a piece that found its way to The Smithsonian.

After two decades working for Steuben, Max started his own business in Corning which he ran for 28 years before being asked by Steuben Glass to come back, which he did for three years before returning to his own work.

In 2019, travel icon Samantha Brown explored Steuben and spent some time with Max. She had this to say: “The Erlacher Glass Collection is part history lesson, part artisan marvel, and part love story.” The love story was that of Max and his wife, Kitty, but also of their shared love for glass. Kitty is the dynamo who runs Erlacher Glass in the Home Again shop on Market Street which features “one-of-a-kind exhibition pieces and Max’s engraved works . . .” – Samantha Brown, Places to Love Season 3

You can learn more about Max Erlacher and hear stories about his work, including some of the famous pieces in this video interview.