Glass Stories.
From soju glasses to sake cups, vodka shot glasses to beer mugs — the cultural history behind every drinking vessel, told concisely.
All Articles.
The Icewine Glass — The Mouthful Canada Presses from Frozen Grapes
Most wine glasses are big, made to open up the aroma. The icewine glass is conspicuously small. The tiny yield pressed from grapes frozen on the vine, a wine that must be drunk cold, and the story of how a colder country took a German wine and became its largest producer — a small glass holds a Canadian winter.
The Granyonyi Stakan — The Faceted Glass That Held the Soviet Union
A single thick, faceted glass filled the tables of the entire Soviet Union. The 200ml standard said to be built to survive canteen dishwashers, the legend that the sculptor Mukhina designed it, the culture of splitting a half-litre three ways, and the communal glass chained to a street soda machine — the story of a cup whose very ordinariness became a symbol.
The Porrón — Spain's Shared Pour You Never Touch with Your Lips
The porrón is the glass pitcher that circles a Catalan table. You hold it a hand's width from your face and catch a thin stream of wine in your mouth — your lips never touch the spout, so a dozen people can drink from one vessel. How to pour it, why it has two spouts, its roots in a Roman drinking horn, and how it even managed to annoy George Orwell.
The Quaich — Scotland's Two-Handled Cup of Trust
The vessel that represents Scotland, whisky's homeland, is not a glass but a shallow bowl. The two-handled quaich is a cup of friendship, passed and shared with both hands. From its Gaelic name cuach to the pledge of trust in its handles, to weddings and the Keepers of the Quaich — the story of a drinking vessel born not for one, but for many.
The Patiala Peg — In India, Whisky Is Measured by the Hand, Not the Glass
India has no whisky glass of its own — but it has a unit of its own. The chhota peg, the bada peg, and the legendary Patiala peg poured to the width of four fingers. A story written not in the shape of the glass, but in the size of the pour.