According to Nancy McMichael, a snow globe collector profiled in a 1997 article in The New York Times, the first snow globes were showcased at the 1878 Paris Universal Exposition by a local glassware firm. She isn’t the only one who noticed. As described in the (exhaustive) reports of the U.S. Commissioners to the exposition, the water-filled globes each featured a little man holding an umbrella, and “a white powder which, when the paper weight is turned upside down, falls in an imitation of a snow storm.” The next iteration of the snow globe came in 1889, again at the Paris Universal Exposition. As McMichael writes in her book Snowdomes, this time the globe—which was the work of an enterprising souvenir vendor—featured a tiny ceramic version of the just-unveiled Eiffel Tower, and the whole ball fit in the palm of a hand. (An example of the globe lives at the Bergstrom-Mahler Museum of Glass in Wisconsin.)

Following in the style of Walter Martin and Paloma Munoz’s realistic and detailed snow globe creations, the Danish architectural firm Ja-Ja made a special series of snow globes to celebrate Christmas. These creations show what the “Nisse” (a small Scandinavian mythological creature that helps around the house) are up to in modern times. This particular globe shows a Nisse working away on a rooftop garden just out of sight of us silly humans. More details at custom snow globe.

To become a wide spread global gift, globes needed to be manufactured more efficiently. In 1927, an American, Joseph Garaja pioneered production improvements filling snow globes underwater. They went from an expensive individually crafted object to a cheaply made mass-produced item. Mass popularity grew in the 1940’s with the increased use of plastic and the development of the tourist industry. For those who could afford to travel with their families, souvenirs were in high demand. In response to this new market, the snow globe became lighter in weight, dome-shaped on top of an opaque colorful base. By the 1950’s every city and roadside attraction had its own snowglobe souvenir.

The snow globe was invented by accident when a mechanic tried to improve the light bulb. Shaking snow globes are synonymous with Christmastime, but they came about by accident. In 1900, a surgical instruments mechanic in Vienna named Edwin Perzy was trying to improve the brightness of the light bulb. He was inspired by shoemakers of the time who would mount “a glass globe filled with water in front of [a] flame” and attempted doing the same thing with the lightbulb. Unfortunately, he discovered that process didn’t work so well. His son told the BBC what happened next: “One day he found a white powder, semolina, used for baby food. And he poured it into the glass globe, and it got soaked by the water and floated very slowly to the base of the globe.” This reminded him of snow falling. Next thing you know, the first snow globe company, Original Vienna Snow Globes, was created in 1905. And it’s still in business today! Source: https://www.qstomize.com/collections/custom-snow-globe.