Spandrel glass

Description

Any of several types of glass used in building construction to cover the portion of horizontal wall space between the knee walls and spandrel beams. In the 1950s, spandrel glass referred to ceramic-coated plate glass but today the term includes many types of transparent glass coated on one side with paint and enamel. In the early 1950s, Pittsburgh Plate Glass (PPG) produced custom ceramic coated glass spandrels for the Lever House and the Museum of Modern Art. This led to their commercial production of Spandrelite®, a ceramic coated glass, in 1955. It quickly became popular commonly used for glass box type commercial buildings.

Synonyms and Related Terms

vidro de peitoril (Port.); Spandrelite® [PPG]; Vitrolux [Libbey-Owens-Ford]

Resources and Citations

• Robert McKinley, "Spandrel Glass", in Twentieth-Century Building Materials, T. Jester (ed.), McGraw-Hill: New York, 1995.