La Rochere

In 1475, Simon de Thysac, a gentleman glassmaker, was granted the right to make heavy and slender glasses at the "Rochiers" and thus founded the glassworks. La Rochère is located on the borders of the Lorraine and Franche-Comté regions, on the edge of the extensive Darney forest which provided the firewood to heat the furnaces as well as ferns, whose ashes provide the potash necessary for the fusion of glass. Silica was extracted from the mottled sandstone whilst the chalky soil on which the "vôge" and its vast leafy forests are situated, provided the lime.