Lyngby Vase in Porcelain or Glass: H20.5 or H25 cm

The Lyngby Vase has been made as the same fluted cylinder since 1936, and it now exists in two materials that behave in almost opposite ways: opaque white porcelain and mouth blown glass. At the same height, one hides the stems completely and the other puts them on show. This is how the H20.5 cm and H25 cm versions compare in each material.

One cylinder, two surfaces

The shape does not change between the materials. It is a straight-sided cylinder scored from base to rim with vertical flutes, finished with a flat lip and no neck to narrow the opening. Karakter Copenhagen carries the design credit in the current Lyngby Porcelæn range, and the same profile runs through both the ceramic and the glass versions.

What changes is what the flutes do with light. On the Lyngby Vase H20.5 cm white porcelain, the fluting works as relief. Each rib takes daylight on one side and falls into shadow on the other, so the vase reads as a column of fine vertical stripes that shift as you move past it. The surface is even and the eye stops at the outside of the vase.

In glass, the same ribs refract. Light travels through the wall, bends at every flute and breaks up whatever sits behind, so the Lyngby Vase H20.5 cm mouth blown glass looks lit from inside on a windowsill and turns dense and quiet against a dark wall. The flutes also distort the stems standing in the water, which is the single biggest difference between the two materials in daily use.

The four versions side by side

Two things in that table matter more than they look. The jump from 20.5 cm to 25 cm adds only 4.5 cm of height but takes the diameter from Ø11 to Ø15 cm in porcelain, which is roughly double the opening area and a different class of bouquet. And the glass versions are heavier than the porcelain ones at the same height, 0.825 kg against 0.77 kg at H20.5 cm and 1.7 kg against 1.3 kg at H25 cm, despite being marginally narrower. Thick mouth blown walls put that weight low down, so the glass holds steady under top-heavy branches.

White porcelain: the silhouette does the work

The porcelain versions are opaque, so everything below the rim disappears: stem ends, leaves, cloudy water, a florist's frog. That is useful with flowers that look good above the line and untidy below it, tulips as they bend, ranunculus, anything cut from the garden with uneven stems. You arrange only what is visible.

The Lyngby Vase H25 cm white porcelain is the one to reach for when the flowers arrive in a full bunch. At Ø15 cm and 1.3 kg it takes a supermarket bouquet without the stems splaying, and it is tall enough to carry branches in spring. The H20.5 cm version, at Ø11 cm, is a narrower and more disciplined thing: three or five stems, or a single peony, held upright rather than allowed to fan.

Porcelain is also the version that works with nothing in it. Empty, the glass vases show their own shadow and a slightly hollow look, while the white cylinder stays a solid object, which is why the Lyngby Vase so often sits on a shelf or a mantelpiece year-round with no flowers near it.

Mouth blown glass: the stems join in

The glass versions turn the arrangement into something you see all the way down. Water level, stem colour and the way the flutes bend each stalk become part of the object, so a few green stems in clear glass already make a composition. It rewards flowers with good stems, tulips again, amaryllis, dahlias, and it punishes stems you would rather not look at.

Colour is where the glass pulls ahead. Both heights are made in Swirl white, Copenhagen green, Burgundy, Clear, Olive green and Smoke, and the Lyngby Vase H25 cm mouth blown glass adds Midnight blue. The swirl finish is the reason no two pieces match. Specially trained glassblowers apply the colour by hand in a spiral around the hot glass before the vase is blown, so the pattern stretches with the form and lands differently every time. The fluting and the spiral run against each other, which gives the glass versions a livelier surface than the straight ribs of the porcelain.

Practically, the clear and smoke finishes sit best where light comes from behind them, a windowsill or a glass-topped table. Copenhagen green, Burgundy, Olive green and Midnight blue read as coloured objects in a room with less light, closer in effect to the porcelain but with depth in the wall.

Choosing one, or building a group

Choose porcelain if the vase has to earn its place when it is empty, if you buy mixed bouquets, or if the room already has a lot of reflective surfaces. Choose glass if you want the vase to change with the light through the day, if you like arrangements with few stems, or if you want colour without adding a painted object to the room.

If you are buying two, the most useful pair is not two of the same size. Take one H25 cm as the working vase for bouquets and one H20.5 cm for single stems, then split the materials, for example the taller in porcelain and the shorter in glass. Grouped together, the shared fluting holds them as a set even though the surfaces differ, and the 4.5 cm height step is enough to keep the silhouettes distinct on a shelf.

Care is the same for both: dishwasher safe at a maximum of 55°C. With the glass versions, let them cool before handling, and dry the inside of the porcelain thoroughly before it goes back on a wooden surface.

Readers weighing up other Danish vases with a strong surface pattern may find our comparison of Hammershøi and Omaggio useful, since it turns on the same question of relief against colour. For the wider range of tableware and vases that share this Danish porcelain house's language, see the full Lyngby Porcelæn collection.