We’re in a studio in downtown Prague, a vast vaulted space housed inside an old cloister, in front of the white-hot roar of an open glass furnace. Martin is one of the world’s most celebrated glass blowers; an artist who is both keeping this traditional art-form alive and propelling it forwards in to the future with his mixture of classic and modern pieces.

Budweiser is working with retailers to tap into consumer excitement around the tournament, offering limited-edition prizes to further engage supporters and increase sales throughout the competition. The 2018 FIFA World Cup Russia™ saw an 18% increase in sales in the beer category than average for the year, equating to an additional 1.4m shoppers. For hundreds of years, the kingdom of Bohemia was the seat of Emperors, royalty and the nobility. During the Renaissance, it was discovered that the countryside’s raw materials yielded glass finer and more stable than that found around Venice, Italy – the big rival glassmaking region of the time. In the seventeenth century, Caspar Lehmann, gem cutter to Emperor Rudolf II, developed a method of engraving this Czech glass with copper and bronze wheels, birthing the decorative cut glass style that remains prized all over the world.The obvious comparison is wine. In the same way we wouldn’t accept red wine served in a Champagne glass because it would dull those essential aromas, notes and flavours, we shouldn’t expect a beer to taste the same in any glass either.” As the official sponsor of the FIFA Women’s World Cup ™ and the England Football teams, Budweiser – a proud part of Budweiser Brewing Group – is launching its biggest ever Off-Trade campaign in the UK, with a whole host of tailored mechanics across the grocery and convenience channels. I take a long drink and it’s incredible. And I get it. I understand. Together, this glass and this beer work in synchronicity, bringing the ingredients of Budvar’s long brewing process to life and perfectly amplifying those characteristics that make this beer so special: the touch of hops in the aromatic foam and the fresh crispness balanced with that rich, malt lager body. For those not in the know, Lada was a modernist Czech artist of the early twentieth century and a favourite of Pablo Picasso. Lada’s subversive, caricature-style bar scenes captured the interior and decoration of the Czech pub at the time perfectly. “The forms and details in pictures of Josef Lada still feel very modern,” Rony continues. “But they have this obvious historical element too. In his pictures I could see the details of Czech beer glasses as they were a hundred years ago and I designed this shape for Budvar using this as inspiration.” I head across Prague to the new studio of Rony Plesl, artist, sculptor, designer, and one of the world’s foremost names in the art of glass. Inside its great front doors, Rony’s beautiful and newly remodeled space is buzzing with artists, collectors and luminaries, all gathered to celebrate the studio’s opening. Positioned around me, his work speaks for itself. I wander between geometric installation pieces resembling great cut and coloured crystals, and down dazzlingly beautiful rows of intricately cut vases, bowls and glasses. In one corner are what look like branches chopped from trees, except these are stunning, neon-coloured pieces glowing an otherworldly green; part of his recent exhibition at the V&A in London.

But it’s definitely time we did. Because when you’re talking quality beer, it turns out that what the beer goes in can have almost as much influence on the taste, texture and the drinking experience as what goes into the beer.This is the reason we’re here: a look at the brand-new Budweiser Budvar glass. A work of art if ever there was one, and the first glassware to be introduced to bars and pubs across the world by the iconic South Bohemian brewery in years. To help generate excitement around the competition, there will also be an array of point of sale and displays that hero these legendary players bringing consumers closer to the Lionesses than ever before. These include out-of-home (OOH) adverts and front of store displays that feature the England players alongside Budweiser products. Therefore, these glasses would make a great addition to any Establishment, New Home Bar or that Man Cave, to just to that growing Budweiser collection or as the perfect gift for the Budweiser Drinker in your life.

Behind him, neatly lined up on shelves above the bar, is a veritable cross-section of glass varieties, showing the sheer range of shapes and sizes on offer to drinkers. As he explains, he gestures to a line of taller, thinner shaped pint glasses: These are Officially Branded Budweiser Glasses. They make your Budweiser drinking experience always seem vastly improved when drinking your Budweiser from these Branded Glasses. By bringing together these two world-famous Czech arts, brewing and glassmaking, Budvar has created that rare thing: a beer glass with a purpose, a beauty and a design that not only tells a story but honours tradition and elevates the experience of drinking the beer within it. Glass is a magic material.” Rony explains when I catch up with him. “It doesn’t have a fixed crystal structure. It is still in motion.” This is part of his forty-year fascination with it, and explains the sheer range in his work. For as well as an international reputation as an artist of monumental sculptures, Rony’s glassware and product design is equally visionary and award-winning. It meant he was the perfect partner to entrust with creating the new Budvar glass.Wide, weighty, pleasingly tailored to fit the hand and with a rounded and fluted cut-glass detail to its lower half – as soon as it’s in your hands, you start to appreciate the time, detail and craft that has gone into its creation. It’s truly a thing to behold, and every bit worthy of holding the slow-matured and traditionally brewed lager that it’s been designed for: a beer that has only ever been made in the same place, in the same way, with the same four quality ingredients, for over 125 years.