Reeded is a handsome pattern Imperial made in the mid 1930s in rich colors like Ritz Blue (mid cobalt), Stiegel Green (rich dark green), ruby, amber, crystal and a tangerine shade. Later Imperial re-released Reeded in the mid Century popular colors of Smoke, ebony, mustard.
You may know Reeded by the name “Spun” or “Whirlpool”. The Imperial Glass Encyclopedia, issued by the National Imperial Collectors’ Society calls it Reeded; Replacements and Hazel Marie Weatherman call it “Spun” and Gene Florence gives all three names. It’s a neat design by any name.
The pieces are fairly thick with deep, narrow horizontal grooves. It’s quite distinctive. There are other depression era patterns with horizontal ridges and grooves – think Manhattan – but the shapes and colors are completely different and the grooves and ridges on Spun are very narrow.
I’ve only had one piece in stock, and haven’t seen too many others. From my reference books and looking online we can see that the most common Reeded pieces are a beverage set with a pitcher and several tumbler sizes, the bowl shown above (which I had in crystal, see below) and different vases. Imperial made an interesting jar, with straight sides and a flat top, which I’ve seen on eBay but not elsewhere.
The foot on several pieces is another tell-tale that Imperial made Spun. Take a close look at both bowls pictured and notice the indentation just above the base; the curved out section just below the indentation is the foot, it’s subtle. Many Imperial patterns had similar feet on plates, pitchers, serving bowls. Many companies made tumblers or cups with feet but Imperial is the only one I can think of offhand that put a foot on a plate.
Reeded is another of the designs where Imperial did not make a dinner set. If you’ve read all the posts in this series on Imperial depression patterns you probably noticed that is a theme. Imperial seemed to view their glassware as decorative, or beverage sets or possibly tiny luncheon sets, but we don’t see the full dinnerware sets like we do in many Hocking or Federal patterns.
Reeded has design and shape that fit into contemporary homes and mid-Century decor. It looks sharp!