Anchor Hocking
Lancaster, Ohio glass manufacturer founded 1905. Libbey’s friendly competitor and the source of much of the mid-century American bar glassware that vintage tiki bars actually used. Heavier bottoms, thicker walls, and 1950s pattern revivals make their drinkware feel more period-appropriate than Libbey’s leaner contemporary lines.
The period-correct sibling to Libbey.
Anchor Hocking is the Ohio glass company that competed with Libbey throughout the twentieth century for the American restaurant- and bar-glass market and that, in many ways, is the more period-appropriate brand for a tiki bar. The company was founded in 1905 in Lancaster, Ohio (a short drive from Libbey’s Toledo). Its mid-century output—the Star of David pattern, the Bubble pattern, the Manhattan pattern, the Fire-King jadeite—is exactly what an actual mid-century tiki bar would have used for its non-mug glassware.
What Anchor Hocking makes for exotic cocktails
- Anchor Hocking Old Fashioned (8 oz, Boston pattern or Rocks Bar Glass)—heavier-bottomed than the Libbey equivalent, with a slight wedge taper. The drink feels weightier in the hand. $3–4 each at scale.
- Anchor Hocking Manhattan Cocktail (4.5 oz, stemmed)—small stemmed glass for spirit-forward drinks served up. The classic American shape. The right glass for a Mary Pickford or a Hemingway Daiquiri in 1950s-bar mode.
- Anchor Hocking Footed Hi-Ball / Collins (14 oz)—taller, with a slight foot. Mid-century in feel; nicely shaped for tall exotic cocktails.
Anchor Hocking also still makes the Fire-King jadeite mug—the pale-green opaque-glass coffee mug that became cultural shorthand for mid-century American diners and that has its own collector market. Not strictly an exotic cocktail glass, but worth knowing for the few recipes (and the broader Polynesian Pop aesthetic) where a jadeite mug reads correctly.
For a vintage-leaning home tiki bar, mixing Libbey (for contemporary efficiency) with Anchor Hocking (for period character) is the right move.
To go deeper
- Brand anchorhocking.com for the current catalog.
- Sourcing Amazon stocks most current SKUs; Target and Walmart carry the Boston and Manhattan patterns. Vintage Anchor Hocking from the 1950s–70s lives on the secondary market.
- Vintage Mid-Century Cocktail Glassware Collection on eBay — period pieces run $5–15 per glass and are the most period-correct option of all.
- Related entries Libbey, Vintage Tiki Glassware.