Coreless Swirls

Coreless Swirls are as their name implies – they lack a central core. They consist only of outer ribbons and/or threads. Coreless Swirls are a German handmade marble that is less commonly seen than the 4 other swirl varieties with central cores (Latticino Core Swirls, Divided Core Swirls, Solid Core Swirls, and Ribbon Core Swirls).

Surprisingly, Coreless Swirls are priced as common swirls even though they are less common.

Sizes vary from peewee (1/2” or under) to usually around 1-1/2”. Larger examples are rarely seen. Price gradually increases based on size. There were likely fewer larger examples made because of the reduced visual appeal due to a missing colorful core.

However, to a collector, they often find the unusual and rare appealing, even if the visual appeal is lacking. So larger examples of Coreless Swirls would be a great find.

Unusual types of Coreless Swirls would be End of Cane (first off the cane) examples, where the outer threads fan out and come to the surface opposite of a single pontil. Those were typically discarded by the maker.

Another unusual type of Coreless Swirl would be a 2-stage Coreless Swirl, where there’s two stages of thread or ribbon construction but a missing core, as seen in the example photo for this page.

Colored matrix glass are NOT rare for Coreless Swirls.  These would instead be considered Banded Transparent Swirls, a fairly common type of colored glass marbles.