page_title: Forest glass
section_title: Location of glasshouses
hierarchical_section_title: Forest glass / Location of glasshouses
context_page_description: Forest glass is late medieval glass produced in northwestern and central Europe from approximately 1000–1700 AD using wood ash and sand as the main raw materials and made in factories known as glasshouses in forest areas. It is characterized by a variety of greenish-yellow colors, the earlier products often being of crude design and poor quality, and was used mainly for everyday vessels and increasingly for ecclesiastical stained glass windows. Its composition and manufacture contrast sharply with Roman and pre-Roman glassmaking centered on the Mediterranean and contemporaneous Byzantine and Islamic glass making to the east.
context_section_description: The vast amounts of wood needed to produce glass in this way dictated that glasshouses be located in forest areas and that the woodland be managed carefully by coppicing and pollarding to maximise the wood resource and to optimise the size of wood pieces used. Even so, periodically the glasshouse would have to relocate, as the woodland was depleted. The glass industry had to compete for wood supplies with other industries such as mining, and domestic demand. In sixteenth-century England, an embargo was placed on the use of wood for fuel for glassmaking. Glasshouses often were located in forests owned by the church. One of the main uses of forest glass was for ecclesiastical stained glass windows.
caption: Forest glasshouse of eighteenth century
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