Collection: Paperweights

A paperweight is a small solid object heavy enough, when placed on top of papers, to keep them from blowing away in a breeze or from moving under the strokes of a painting brush. While any object, such as a stone, can serve as a paperweight, decorative paperweights of glass are also produced, either by individual artisans or factories. The decorative paperweights are usually in limited editions, and are collected as works of fine glass art, some of which are exhibited in museums. First produced in about 1845, particularly in France, such decorative paperweights declined in popularity before undergoing a revival in the mid-twentieth century.