February 18

February 18, 1848, is the birthdate of artist and glassmaker Louis Comfort Tiffany. His Art Nouveau creations included stained glass windows, mosaic lamps, furniture, textiles, ceramics, enamels, metalwork and jewelry. The son of Charles Lewis Tiffany, founder of Tiffany & Co. (1837), he started out as a painter but became a glassmaker from about 1875. He designed the interior of Mark Twain’s house in Hartford, CT, and Pres. Chester A. Arthur hired him in 1881 to redecorate the White House public rooms. His Tiffany Studios, which became part of Tiffany & Co. in 1902, created a famous range of iridescent glass he called “Favrile” (“handmade”), which was treated with metallic oxides to produce a luxurious surface, seen in his vases and hanging- and table-lamps. His earliest jewelry designs were exhibited at the 1904 Louisiana Purchase Exposition in St. Louis. Pictured: “View of Oyster Bay,” stained glass, 1908.