What is Sabino glass?

Sabino glass is the term for the opalescent vessels, figurines and lighting fixtures that Marius-Ernest Sabino produced in the 1920s and ’30s. Sabino was one of the French creators of art glass who helped make it a signature of Art Nouveau at the turn of the 20th century before pivoting to embrace the geometric style of Art Deco. Returning home following his service in World War I, Sabino founded a factory that manufactured light fixtures in wood and bronze, but he quickly switched his focus to glass as his experiments with the material yielded novel results. By 1925, he had developed an opalescent glass with an iridescence reminiscent of soap bubbles or peacock feathers. Many of his custom pieces are huge, such as the ones he created for the SS Île de France in 1927 and for the Grand Salon of the SS Normandie in 1935. On 1stDibs, explore a selection of Sabino art glass.