Haus Finds No. 010 — Vintage Arcopal Fleur d'Été French Milk Glass Dinner Plates – Set of 6

I found these in a thrift store, stacked in among the usual long rows of fragmented china and plasticware. These were unmistakably different. I picked one up, put it down, picked it up again. It looked like milk glass — which I’d mainly seen as vases — but plates? I wasn’t sure what I was looking at. I love a good puzzle to solve, so they came home with me.
Turns out they’re French milk glass, made about 50 years ago.
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THE FIND
In fact, they're Arcopal — opal glass, opaque and tempered nearly to the point of unbreakable. Arcopal was born in 1958 in Arques, a glassmaking town in the north of France. That explains what I couldn’t quite place in the thrift store: opal glass has a density and a smoothness that ordinary china and stoneware don't. And all things opal and opalite are having a moment right now. Arcopal isn’t made from opal, of course, but it does have a similar milky, luminous quality to it. 

But, wait, there’s more. Flip one over and you'll find the maker's wink: an archer with his bow drawn, because arc is French for bow — a small joke signed into the underside of every plate, where no guest would ever see it. French families reached for Arcopal precisely because it could take a knock — dropped, stacked, passed hand to hand through decades of dinners — and come out intact. Optimism you can run through the dishwasher.
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THE DETAILS
· Vintage Arcopal France opal (milk) glass
· Fleur d'Été ("Summer Flower") pattern — wildflower motif with a coral rim line
· Tempered opaline glass — dinner plate
· Measures approximately 10.25" in diameter
· Made in France · 1970s
· Quantity: 6 (complete set)
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CONDITION
Pre-owned vintage, and remarkably clean for their age. Each of the six plates is free of chips and cracks. There may be faint surface marks or light utensil wear given their age, all shown in the photos. A full set of six that survived five decades intact — which, for glass this old, is its own small triumph.

The history is part of its charm. This set's worth keeping. Available in the Haus.