CUCUMBER STRAIGHTENER
Hand blown glass, 1840s
A rare survivor
£275
Dimensions
L 53cm (21") , Diameter 7.5cm (3")
Description
Very early, very scarce, and in impeccable condition.
A large, thick walled, hand blown, open-ended, tapering vessel with a top 'knop' around which the twine is tied as the cucumber grows inside the tube after the new yellow flower is carefully fed into it ......... Victorian obsession and ingenuity at its best ! The cucumber straightener's invention is often alleged to be by Robert Stephenson of "Stephenson's Rocket" fame (and stickler for growing perfect veg) but that is apochryphal - for while he did have similar glass tubes made in his factory c 1850, the first hand blown ones such as this predate that by a decade.
The glass is some 6mm thick and delightfully full of imperfect bubbles, eddies and glides. That it is quite perfectly free of damage, chips or cracks is miraculous.
Provenance : in its 180 years this glass has travelled amongst the walled kitchen gardens of four different Devon estates - the most recent being Castle Drogo, Sir Edwin Lutyen's extraordinary Edwardian creation. Each transfer was through a gardener handing it on down at retirement or moving on to the next garden and taking this precious glass tube with him.
By 1900 straighteners were more commonplace (see ad in attached photos) but of course were fragile and prone to mishaps - so any survivor is rare. This one is quite exceptional.
Perfectly useable still, it also makes a gorgeous and delightfully bizarre decorative item indoors.
Stock No. 2017
