What are Orchid vintage glass sculpture-vases by Timo Sarpaneva?

The most beautiful man-made object, according to the American magazine The Home Beautiful.

The Grand Prix at the XI Milan Triennale in 1954—the highest award for designers at the time. This event largely marked the beginning of worldwide recognition for Finnish design.

All this acclaim is about the Orchid series of crystal sculpture-vases by designer Timo Sarpaneva.

Timo Sarpaneva, the designer for the flagship Iittala art glass factory, created the Orchid in 1953.

This stunning crystal sculpture, which also serves as a vase, is made using a unique technique.

As early as the late 19th century, Finnish glassblowers invented a new method for creating bubbles inside the form of a glass object.

By applying water to the blowpipe, steam was introduced into the heated glass mass. The water, under the influence of heat, turned into steam.

In the early 1950s, Timo Sarpaneva perfected this technology: using water in the blowpipe, the shape of the object was created through the bubble itself. It wasn’t blown in the traditional sense.

The resulting objects had fluid forms with smooth, rounded edges.