The Russian Tea Room’s famous guests and colorful owners have come and gone, but what remains in the space is an interior dominated by a magnificent collection of art glass. With the recent reopening of this landmark restaurant, the dazzling work of several international artists can be seen once again.

Though the collection is the restaurant’s most artistic asset, it has not been the center of the restaurant’s history. In 1995, the late Warner LeRoy purchased the spot — originally opened in 1926 by former Russian dancers — from the actress Faith Stewart-Gordon, who ran it after the death of her husband Sidney Kaye. Soon after purchasing the property, LeRoy began the process of revamping the establishment and commissioned glass artists to help him re-create an exuberant interpretation of pre-revolutionary Russia.

When LeRoy’s $30 million, four-year renovation was completed in October 1999, the interior was much-photographed but overshadowed by LeRoy’s dramatic personal life, the debatable quality of the food, and the clientele. References to the interior were often criticized or incorrectly described, and the works became simply a part — albeit an ornate part — of the space.

After LeRoy’s death in 2001 and the Tea Room’s closure in 2002, the property changed hands twice, which led to fears that the works would face the wrecking ball. The news that the current owners, RTR Funding Group, have allowed the works to stand in the original condition and placement is welcome, indeed.

“It was stomach wrenching,” a glass artist, Dan Legree of Savoy Studios, said.

Mr. Legree’s work in the Tea Room includes the expansive deep blue glass panels on the second floor and etched gold leaf rabbits on the third floor. The blue panels are particularly arresting: The shade and intensity of the blue changes as the viewer shifts angle, from side to side. A closer look shows a glittery metallic character trapped in the fused glass.

The metallic quality is specific to this form of glass, known as dichroic. The term refers to the two colors the glass creates — the light beams are one color when transmitted and another color when reflected.

The technique — developed by NASA in the ’50s and ’60s to protect spacecraft instruments and humans from cosmic radiation and glare — involves depositing extremely thin films of metal vacuum on a glass surface. Artists have only had access to this expensive substance since NASA contractor Murray Schwartz, also a glass artist, began producing and distributing the material in recent decades.

Mr. Legree’s panels, each measuring 18 feet tall by 50 feet long, were made using 10,000 pieces of waterjet-cut and fused glass created in his Portland, Oregon, studio, and then assembled on site one piece at a time. Mr. Legree said he had six to 10 assistants working on the panels for about eight months in Portland, with the installation taking another month on the 57th Street.

“I remember Warner wanted this certain blue — so rich, and we just weren’t hitting it. We went through so much glass trying to get that color right,” he said.

At the far end of the ballroom stands a leafless tree dangling 35 Fabergé-inspired glass eggs handblown by Italian glassmaker Lino Tagliapietra, one of the finest glassblowers in the world.

Mr. Tagliapietra used numerous Venetian glass techniques, such as reticello (which resembles netting), pulegoso (bubbles) and pittura a smalti (glass paste enameling) to create the oneof-kind eggs.

By working in the Fabergé style, Mr. Tagliapietra was able to use skills that are rarely in demand today. In a 1999 press release, he said: “To select and experiment with different Venetian glass-blowing techniques in order to capture their essence is a challenge that no artist would pass up.”

At the time of the Tea Room’s 1999 renovation, the collection of 35 eggs was estimated at $500,000. Mr. Legree estimated each egg to be worth between $25,000 and $30,000 today (or $1 million for the collection).

Among the most photographed pieces is a 15-foot-tall, 2,300-pound revolving aquarium in the shape of a dancing bear, produced by Romanian sculptor Ovidiu Colea, who was assisted by Albanian mold-maker Alfonse Paholy.

Upstairs, the ballroom is host to a series of 10 carved glass panels — each about 335 pounds — depicting Russian circus bears. Created by Kathy Bradford of Lyons, Colo., the carvings are in half-inch thick annealed glass layered in front of mirrored glass. Ms. Bradford also created the sand-carved and airbrushed landscape of 18th-century Moscow on the first floor.

The concept of this opulent interior was overseen by an interior designer, Jeffrey Higginbottom, who passed away just days before the Tea Room’s reopening. Together with LeRoy, he restored the main dining room to its original ex-pat salon look, complete with gold samovars, red leather banquettes, and year-round Christmas ornaments. Throughout the space are custom-made chandeliers, hand-painted faux wood inlay walls, copper and gold leaf moldings, art-glass ceiling fixtures, and gilded stags heads. The only things missing today are the Tiffany glass ceilings on the second and third floors, one of which remains with the LeRoy family.

The new owners filled in that ceiling with bright glasswork that compliments the setting. Squares of glass created by the RoMarDen Stained Glass Studio, located in Brooklyn, were custom cut to fit the space. It’s a new addition — and, given this restaurant’s history, it is surely not the last.