I HAVE A MINOR COMPLAINT: This Glass is Ridiculous

There is a famous episode of the Simpsons in which Homer is given the power to design his own car. Given no constraints, he includes every item on his wish list, never stopping to consider how they will look when mashed together atop a single chassis. The result is something like this:

This is the IPA glass introduced seven years ago by Spiegelau. Sam Calagione and Ken Grossman, recognized and beloved brewing saints, advised Spiegelau on the project. The glass has endured and become a fixture in pubs like Rogue (Astoria), where I located the specimen pictured above. None of these facts obscure the reality that this glass, taken as a bulbous, childlish whole, is absurd.

According to designers, the elongated snout-like bowl creates an aroma “cannon”; the Michelin-man bubble-ridges at the base agitate the beer into further aromatic heights. Curves can be nice, but these are jejune—they don’t flow naturally, but rather bulge foolishly like the barrel on a 1960s toy ray-gun.

The whole is, like the Homer car, worse than the parts. It’s a clumsy shape, droopy and inelegant. There’s something of a melted-candle quality to it. Specialty glassware is a timeless feature of beer presentation, but this glass ignores the visual, instead focusing on gimmicks to maximize aroma. Given the incredible aromatics IPAs now vent, one wonders why such a glass is even necessary.

I won’t win this war—it seems drinkers have accepted (and, to my horror, even embraced) this glass. That makes it no more attractive. It is a truly ugly glass.