page_title: Pyrex
section_title: History
hierarchical_section_title: Pyrex / History
caption_attribution_description: English: Newspaper ad showing various Pyrex baking dishes
context_page_description: Pyrex is a brand introduced by Corning Inc. in 1915 for a line of clear, low-thermal-expansion borosilicate glass used for laboratory glassware and kitchenware. It was later expanded to include clear and opal ware products made of soda-lime glass.
  Corning no longer manufactures or markets consumer glass kitchenware and bakeware. Corelle Brands, which was spun off from Corning Inc. in 1998 under the name Corning Consumer Products Company and since renamed, continues to license the pyrex brand for their tempered soda-lime glass line of kitchenware products sold for the consumer market in the United States, South America, and Asia. In the regions of Europe, Africa, and the Middle East, the PYREX brand is licensed by International Cookware for use on their borosilicate glass products. The brand name has also been used for non-glass kitchen utensils and cookware in various regions for several decades.
context_section_description: Borosilicate glass was first made by German chemist and glass technologist Otto Schott, founder of Schott AG in 1893, 22 years before Corning produced the Pyrex brand. Schott AG sells the product under the name "Duran".
  In 1908, Eugene Sullivan, director of research at Corning Glass Works, developed Nonex, a borosilicate low-expansion glass, to reduce breakage in shock-resistant lantern globes and battery jars. Sullivan had learned about Schott's borosilicate glass as a doctoral student in Leipzig, Germany. Jesse Littleton of Corning discovered the cooking potential of borosilicate glass by giving his wife Bessie Littleton a casserole dish made from a cut-down Nonex battery jar. Corning removed the lead from Nonex and developed it as a consumer product. Pyrex made its public debut in 1915 during World War I, positioned as an American-produced alternative to Duran.
  A Corning executive gave the following account of the etymology of the name "Pyrex":
  The word PYREX is probably a purely arbitrary word which was devised in 1915 as a trade-mark for products manufactured and sold by Corning Glass Works. While some people have thought that it was made up from the Greek pyr and the Latin rex, we have always taken the position that no graduate of Harvard would be guilty of such a classical hybrid. Actually, we had a number of prior trade-marks ending in the letters ex. One of the first commercial products to be sold under the new mark was a pie plate, and in the interests of euphonism the letter r was inserted between pie and ex and the whole thing condensed to PYREX.
  In the late 1930s and 1940s, Corning also introduced other products under the Pyrex brand, including opaque tempered soda-lime glass for bowls and bakeware, and a line of Pyrex Flameware for stovetop use; this aluminosilicate glass had a bluish tint caused by the addition of alumino-sulfate. In 1958 an internal design department was started by John B. Ward.  He redesigned the Pyrex ovenware and Flameware.  Over the years, designers such as Penny Sparke, Betty Baugh, Smart Design, TEAMS Design, and others have contributed to the design of the line.
  Corning divested itself of the Corning Consumer Products Company (now known as Corelle Brands) in 1998 and production of consumer Pyrex products went with it. Its previous licensing of the name to Newell Cookware Europe remained in effect. France-based cookware maker Arc International acquired Newell's European business in early 2006 to own rights to the brand in Europe, the Middle East and Africa. In 2007, Arc closed the Pyrex factory in Sunderland moving production to France. The Sunderland factory had first started making Pyrex in 1922   In 2014, Arc International sold off its Arc International Cookware division which operated the Pyrex business to Aurora Capital for its Resurgence Fund II. The business now operates as International Cookware.
caption: Newspaper ad showing Pyrex bakeware from 1922
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