The Best Martini, Coupe and Nick and Nora Glasses

Libbey has supplied American bars and restaurants for well over a century, and the Signature Kentfield is its home version of a classic coupe: a 9 ounce bowl on a long pulled stem, 6.6 inches tall, in what Libbey calls ClearFire glass for clarity. The foot is reinforced and flat, and the stem is seamless.

Nine ounces is generous for a coupe. A shaken daiquiri or a sour sits comfortably with room to carry it, and the same glass pours a coupe of Champagne or holds a dessert. It goes in the dishwasher, and at this price nobody minds when one does not come back out.

Skip it if you want the weightless feel of crystal, or if you mostly stir small martinis. For a 3 ounce drink, the bowl is on the large side.

The catch. Soda-lime glass is thicker at the rim than crystal, and you feel it on the lip.

Cocktail Kingdom sells bar tools and glass to the trade, and Leopold is one of its house lines. The coupe comes in two sizes, 6 and 7.5 ounces. The larger is the more useful at home: enough room for a shaken drink with a little foam, and still small enough that a stirred Manhattan does not look stranded.

It is designed for commercial use, which is the point. The maker says it is dishwasher safe and fits commercial dish racks, and the glass has the plain, slightly sturdy build of something meant to be washed hundreds of times. It looks right on a bar cart without looking precious.

Skip it if you want thin crystal, or if you only need two glasses. It comes in a six pack, and the next size up is a case of 24.

The catch. The maker publishes almost no specs beyond size, including where it is made.

If the martini has to be in a V, this is a good one. Zwiesel Glas, the brand long sold as Schott Zwiesel and distributed in the US by Fortessa, makes the Pure line in Germany from Tritan crystal, its lead-free glass that uses titanium in place of lead and is designed to resist chipping and breakage.

The Pure martini is angular and modern, 7.9 inches tall, and it holds about 12.3 ounces to the brim. That is the modern oversized martini. Pour a normal drink and there is a lot of glass above it, which looks elegant and keeps the drink from sloshing over the edge, if you are careful.

Skip it if you have guests who walk and talk with a drink in hand, or if you prefer a small, cold drink finished before it warms. The Nick and Nora is kinder on both counts.

The catch. Wide V bowls are the easiest cocktail glass to spill from, and this one is big.

Zwiesel 1872 is the handmade line from the same house as Zwiesel Glas, and Enoteca is its top stemware. The martini glass is mouth blown in Hungary from Tritan crystal, the titanium and zirconium oxide glass the maker rates for resistance to breakage, chipping and thermal shock.

It holds 9.9 ounces and stands 7.8 inches tall, 4.7 inches across. The walls and rim are the thinnest in this guide, which is what you pay for: a cold martini in it feels like nothing in the hand. The maker also suggests it for grappa, sherry, cordials and brandy.

Skip it if you break glasses at any regular rate. It is rated for the dishwasher, but the maker warns against forcing the bowl over rack prongs and against twisting bowl and stem while drying by hand, which is how most fine stems end.

The catch. At over $60 a stem, a single breakage costs more than a set of the Libbeys.